The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke

by Arthur C. Clarke

  Garnett looked at me anxiously. I could tell that he wanted to go first, but I smiled back at him through the glass of my helmet and shook my head. Slowly, taking my time, I began the final ascent.

  Even with my spacesuit, I weighed only forty pounds here, so I pulled myself up hand over hand without bothering to use my feet. At the rim I paused and waved to my companion, then I scrambled over the edge and stood upright, staring ahead of me.

  You must understand that until this very moment I had been almost completely convinced that there could be nothing strange or unusual for me to find here. Almost, but not quite; it was that haunting doubt that had driven me forwards. Well, it was a doubt no longer, but the haunting had scarcely begun.

  I was standing on a plateau perhaps a hundred feet across. It had once been smooth—too smooth to be natural—but falling meteors had pitted and scored its surface through immeasurable aeons. It had been levelled to support a glittering roughly pyramidal structure, twice as high as a man, that was set in the rock like a gigantic many-faceted jewel.

  Probably no emotion at all filled my mind in those first few seconds. Then I felt a great lifting of my heart, and a strange inexpressible joy. For I loved the Moon, and now I knew that the creeping moss of Aristarchus and Eratosthenes was not the only life she had brought forth in her youth. The old, discredited dream of the first explorers was true. There had, after all, been a lunar civilisation—and I was the first to find it. That I had come perhaps a hundred million years too late did not distress me; it was enough to have come at all.

  My mind was beginning to function normally, to analyse and to ask questions. Was this a building, a shrine—or something for which my language had no name? If a building, then why was it erected in so uniquely inaccessible a spot? I wondered if it might be a temple, and I could picture the adepts of some strange priesthood calling on their gods to preserve them as the life of the Moon ebbed with the dying oceans, and calling on their gods in vain.

  I took a dozen steps forward to examine the thing more closely, but some sense of caution kept me from going too near. I knew a little of archaeology, and tried to guess the cultural level of the civilisation that must have smoothed this mountain and raised the glittering mirror surfaces that still dazzled my eyes.

  The Egyptians could have done it, I thought, if their workmen had possessed whatever strange materials these far more ancient architects had used. Because of the thing’s smallness, it did not occur to me that I might be looking at the handiwork of a race more advanced than my own. The idea that the Moon had possessed intelligence at all was still almost too tremendous to grasp and my pride would not let me take the final, humiliating plunge.

  And then I noticed something that set the scalp crawling at the back of my neck—something so trivial and so innocent that many would never have noticed it at all. I have said that the plateau was scarred by meteors; it was also coated inches deep with the cosmic dust that is always filtering down upon the surface of any world where there are no winds to disturb it. Yet the dust and the meteor scratches ended quite abruptly in a wide circle enclosing the little pyramid, as though an invisible wall was protecting it from the ravages of time and the slow but ceaseless bombardment from space.

  There was someone shouting in my earphones, and I realised that Garnett had been calling me for some time. I walked unsteadily to the edge of the cliff and signalled him to join me, not trusting myself to speak. Then I went back towards that circle in the dust. I picked up a fragment of splintered rock and tossed it gently toward the shining enigma. If the pebble had vanished at that invisible barrier I should not have been surprised, but it seemed to hit a smooth, hemispherical surface and slide gently to the ground.

  I knew then that I was looking at nothing that could be matched in the antiquity of my own race. This was not a building, but a machine, protecting itself with forces that had challenged Eternity. Those forces, whatever they might be, were still operating, and perhaps I had already come too close. I thought of all the radiations man had trapped and tamed in the past century. For all I knew, I might be as irrevocably doomed as if I had stepped into the deadly, silent aura of an unshielded atomic pile.

  I remember turning then towards Garnett, who had joined me and was now standing motionless at my side. He seemed quite oblivious of me, so I did not disturb him but walked to the edge of the cliff in an effort to marshal my thoughts. There below me lay the Mare Crisium—Sea of Crises, indeed—strange and weird to most men, but reassuringly familiar to me. I lifted my eyes towards the crescent Earth, lying in her cradle of stars, and I wondered what her clouds had covered when these unknown builders had finished their work. Was it the steaming jungle of the Carboniferous, the bleak shoreline over which the first amphibians must crawl to conquer the land—or, earlier still, the long loneliness before the coming of life?

  Do not ask me why I did not guess the truth sooner—the truth that seems so obvious now. In the first excitement of my discovery, I had assumed without question that this crystalline apparition had been built by some race belonging to the Moon’s remote past, but suddenly, and with overwhelming force, the belief came to me that it was as alien to the Moon as I myself.

  In twenty years we had found no trace of life but a few degenerate plants. No lunar civilisation, whatever its doom, could have left but a single token of its existence.

  I looked at the shining pyramid again, and the more remote it seemed from anything that had to do with the Moon. And suddenly I felt myself shaking with a foolish, hysterical laughter, brought on by excitement and over-exertion: for I had imagined that the little pyramid was speaking to me and was saying: ‘Sorry, I’m a stranger here myself.’

  It has taken us twenty years to crack that invisible shield and to reach the machine inside those crystal walls. What we could not understand, we broke at last with the savage might of atomic power and now I have seen the fragments of the lovely, glittering thing I found up there on the mountain.

  They are meaningless. The mechanisms—if indeed they are mechanisms—of the pyramid belong to a technology that lies far beyond our horizon, perhaps to the technology of paraphysical forces.

  The mystery haunts us all the more now that the other planets have been reached and we know that only Earth has ever been the home of intelligent life. Nor could any lost civilisation of our own world have built that machine, for the thickness of the meteoric dust on the plateau has enabled us to measure its age. It was set there upon its mountain before life had emerged from the seas of Earth.

  When our world was half its present age, something from the stars swept through the Solar System, left this token of its passage, and went again upon its way. Until we destroyed it, that machine was still fulfilling the purpose of its builders; and as to that purpose, here is my guess.

  Nearly a hundred thousand million stars are turning in the circle of the Milky Way, and long ago other races on the worlds of other suns must have scaled and passed the heights that we have reached. Think of such civilisations, far back in time against the fading afterglow of Creation, masters of a universe so young that life as yet had come only to a handful of worlds. Theirs would have been a loneliness we cannot imagine, the loneliness of gods looking out across infinity and finding none to share their thoughts.

  They must have searched the star-clusters as we have searched the planets. Everywhere there would be worlds, but they would be empty or peopled with crawling, mindless things. Such was our own Earth, the smoke of the great volcanoes still staining the skies, when that first ship of the peoples of the dawn came sliding in from the abyss beyond Pluto. It passed the frozen outer worlds, knowing that life could play no part in their destinies. It came to rest among the inner planets, warming themselves around the fire of the Sun and waiting for their stories to begin.

  Those wanderers must have looked on Earth, circling safely in the narrow zone between fire and ice, and must have guessed that it was the favourite of the Sun’s children. Here, in the distant
future, would be intelligence; but there were countless stars before them still, and they might never come this way again.

  So they left a sentinel, one of millions they have scattered throughout the universe, watching over all worlds with the promise of life. It was a beacon that down the ages has been patiently signalling the fact that no one had discovered it.

  Perhaps you understand now why that crystal pyramid was set upon the Moon instead of on the Earth. Its builders were not concerned with races still struggling up from savagery. They would be interested in our civilisation only if we proved our fitness to survive—by crossing space and so escaping from the Earth, our cradle. That is the challenge that all intelligent races must meet, sooner or later. It is a double challenge, for it depends in turn upon the conquest of atomic energy and the last choice between life and death.

  Once we had passed that crisis, it was only a matter of time before we found the pyramid and forced it open. Now its signals have ceased, and those whose duty it is will be turning their minds upon Earth. Perhaps they wish to help our infant civilisation. But they must be very, very old, and the old are often insanely jealous of the young.

  I can never look now at the Milky Way without wondering from which of those banked clouds of stars the emissaries are coming. If you will pardon so commonplace a simile, we have broken the glass of the fire-alarm and have nothing to do but to wait.

  I do not think we will have to wait for long.

  Holiday on the Moon

  First appeared in Heiress magazine January - April 1951

  This story was the result of arm-twisting by a charming lady editor for a magazine for young ladies, Heiress. It was published as a four-part serial (January to April 1951) as by Charles Willis. After half a century, I can’t remember why I used a pseudonym—perhaps I was afraid of losing my macho image.

  It was a large, brightly lit room with a magnificent view, of which no one was taking the slightest notice. Beyond the wide window, which ran the whole length of one wall, a snow-flecked mountain-side sloped down to a tiny Alpine village more than a mile below. Despite the distance, every detail was crystal clear. Beyond the village, the ground rose again, more and more steeply, to the great mountain that dominated the sky-line and trailed from its summit a perpetual plume of snow, a white streamer, drifting for ever with the wind.

  It was a wonderful panorama—and it was all an illusion. The Martins’ flat was in the middle of London, and outside the walls a November fog was curling sluggishly through the damp streets. But Mrs Martin had only to turn a switch and the concealed projectors would give her any view she wished, together with the sounds that went with it. Television, which had brought so many pictures into every home, had made this inevitable, and in these opening years of the twenty-first century most houses could have any scenery they pleased.

  Of course, it was rather expensive, but it was such a good way of letting the family get to know the world. Mrs Martin looked round anxiously. At the moment everything seemed a little too quiet for comfort. What she saw was reassuring. Eighteen-year-old Daphne was tuned in to Paris on the TV set, watching a fashion display.

  ‘Mother!’ she called out. ‘You must see this gorgeous scarlet cloak! I’d love one just like it.’

  Michael, who was fifteen, was doing his home-work—or pretending to—and the twelve-year-old twins were in the next room, being audibly thrilled by Grandma’s stories of the London Blitz.

  There was a gentle ‘burr’ from the telephone in the next room.

  ‘Let me answer it!’ shouted Claude.

  ‘No, me!’ yelled Claudia.

  There was a slight scuffle. Then Grandma’s voice could be heard speaking to the operator. ‘Yes, this is Mrs Martin’s flat. I’ll call her. Hilda! It’s a super-long-distance call for you!’

  Super-long-distance! It had never happened before, but everyone knew what it meant. Michael looked up from his work. Even Daphne turned her back on the parade of winter fashion.

  ‘My goodness,’ said Claude, ‘it’s Daddy!’

  ‘Someone told me,’ said Claudia in a hushed voice, ‘that it costs £10 a minute to put through a call from the Moon.’

  ‘I hope Daddy isn’t paying for it!’ gulped Claude.

  ‘Hush, children!’ said Mrs Martin, taking the receiver from Grandma. ‘Yes, Mrs Martin here.’ There was a pause. Then, so clear and close that it gave her almost a shock, her husband’s voice sounded in her ear. It was coming to her across a quarter of a million miles of space, yet it seemed as if he were standing beside her.

  ‘Hallo, Hilda, this is John! Listen carefully, dear—I’ve only got two minutes! I’ve some bad news for you. I can’t come back to Earth next week as we’d hoped. Yes, I know it’s very disappointing after all our plans, but we’ve had some trouble here at the observatory and I simply can’t get away now. But don’t be too upset—I’ve got another plan that’s almost as good. How would you like to come up to the Moon?’

  ‘What?’ gasped his wife.

  It took nearly three seconds for her husband’s laugh to reach her—three seconds for the radio waves, even travelling at their fabulous speed, to make the journey from Earth to Moon.

  ‘Yes, I thought it would surprise you! But why not? Space-travel is as safe now as flying was in Grandma’s day. Anyway, there’s a freighter leaving the Arizona port in three days and returning to Earth a fortnight later. That will give you time to get ready, and we’ll have almost ten days here together at the observatory. I’ll make all the arrangements, so be a dear and don’t argue. And I want you to bring along Daphne and Mike. There’s room for them as well. I’m afraid you’ll have to make peace with the twins, somehow—tell them they’ll have their chance when they’re older!’

  ‘But, John—I can’t…’

  ‘Of course you can—and think how Daphne and Mike will love it! I can’t explain now, but we may never have an opportunity like this again. I’m sending a telegram with all the details. You should get it in an hour or so. Oh, bother—there’s the signal—I must hang up now. Give my love to them all. I do look forward to seeing you. Goodbye, darling.’

  Mrs Martin put down the receiver with a dazed expression. It was just like John. He hadn’t even allowed her time to raise a single objection. But, now she came to think of it, what real objections were there? He was right, of course. Space-travel—at least to the Moon—was safe enough, even though it was still too expensive for a regular passenger service. Presumably John had been able to use his official position to get their reservations.

  Yes, John was quite right. It was too good a chance to miss, and if she didn’t go now, it might be ages before she would see him again. She turned to the anxiously waiting family and said with a smile, ‘I’ve got some news for you.’

  In the ordinary way, a Transatlantic crossing would have been quite an excitement for Daphne and Michael, since it was something they had done only two or three times before in their lives. Now, however, they regarded the two hours’ flight from London Airport to New York as merely an unimportant episode, and occupied most of the time talking about the Moon clearly enough to impress the other passengers.

  They spent only an hour in New York before flying on across the Continent, steadily gaining on the sun, until when they finally swept down over the great Arizona desert it was, by the clock, a couple of hours before the time they had left the flat that same morning.

  From the air, the space-port was an impressive sight. Looking through the observation windows, Daphne could see, spread out below, the great steel frameworks supporting the slim, torpedo-shaped monsters that would soon go roaring up to the stars. Everywhere were huge, gasometer-like fuel-tanks, radio aerials pointing at the sky, and mysterious buildings and structures whose purpose she couldn’t even guess.

  Through all this maze tiny figures scurried to and fro, and vehicles looking like metallic beetles rolled swiftly along the roads.

  Daphne belonged to the first generation that had taken space-travel
for granted. The Moon had been reached almost thirty years ago—twelve years before she was born—and she could just remember the excitement when the first expeditions had landed on Mars and Venus.

  In her short life she had seen Man set out to conquer space, just as, hundreds of years before, Columbus and the great explorers of the Middle Ages had discovered the world. The first stages of the conquest were now over. Small colonies of scientists had been established on Mars and Venus, and on the Moon the great Lunar Observatory, of which Professor Martin was director, had now become the centre of all astronomical research.

  On the Moon’s silent, lonely plains, beneath velvet skies, in which the stars shone brilliantly night and day, with never the least trace of cloud to dim them, the astronomers could work at last under perfect conditions, unhindered by the obscuring atmosphere against which they had always had to fight on Earth.

  The next two hours they spent in the space-port’s headquarters building, being weighed, medically examined and filling up forms. When this was all over, and they were beginning to wonder if the whole thing was really worth while, they found themselves in a small, comfortable office, looking across a desk at a rather jolly, plump man, who seemed to be someone very important.

  ‘Well, Mrs Martin,’ he said cheerfully, ‘I’m glad to say you’re all in excellent health and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t leave in the Centaurus when she takes off. I hope all these examinations haven’t scared you. There is really nothing dangerous about space-flight, but we mustn’t take any chances.

  ‘As you know, a spaceship takes off rather quickly and for a few minutes you feel as if you weigh a ton—but if you’re lying down comfortably that won’t do you any harm, as long as you don’t suffer from certain kinds of heart trouble. Then, when you’re out in space, you won’t have any weight at all, which will feel very odd at first. That used to cause space-sickness in the early days, but we can prevent it now. You’ll be given a couple of tablets to swallow just before take-off. So there’s nothing to worry about, and I’m sure you’ll have a pleasant voyage.’