by Dan Donoghue
“It is still a frontier town. We haven't had it easy here. They didn't tell you much about it on Earth. High America was supposed to be a paradise. It suited them to tell folk that. The truth is, the first six colonies failed with great loss of life. There's more to starting a colony than just going in and dropping people down with a handful of seeds and a hoe. Especially when it takes two years to get a message out, and another two to get an answer back. We had just got started when the big bang went up on Earth. What with new bugs to fight, and new plants to learn about, we've had trouble enough just getting enough to eat. Then, when we made contact with Earth again, they weren't anxious to immigrate. We need population badly, but what we want most is to get rid of the thing that is stopping brain men from coming here. We're falling further, and further behind in technology, and we can't afford that. We got our independence when we were cut off, but if we go on like this we'll become a backyard race, and we'll be annexed by some country, and we won't be able to do a damned thing about it. They destroyed a hell of a lot of their resources in their wars on Earth. There's countries that want ours, and they've only been kept back because we've got treaties with USNCA. Even in it we've got problems. There's parties there who want to turn us into nothing but a mine. As for the crew of the Star-bird, when you spend one month in twenty-four on your home planet, and you're in one of the best paid jobs there is, I suppose it's not hard to think of it as paradise. They start training young, and when they're home they don't much bother about our problems, I can tell you. Mostly they spend their time making problems for us.”
“How do the miners plan to deal with the thing on Death Island?”
“Simple: They want to hit each land mass with nuclear bombs, and keep hitting them until there's nothing bigger than a flea alive on them. They could do it too. You don't have the radiation problems they used to have.”
“If the thing can be found and destroyed, what then?”
“Then we can bring in brain men. We can develop our own technology. We can mine the place ourselves, and sell them the surplus, and we could raise cattle in the millions, and make this a land of plenty.”
“Why can't you get brain men now? Not all of them are sensitives.”
“True, but most get sensie children somewhere in their families. That stops them. A man wants to live where his kids can survive.”
“Why is the population so low. Why isn't there more natural increase?”
“Kids seem to pick up most new bugs that come in. Mortality rate is still fairly high, but birth rate is down too. It's one of those things. We don't know why. This thing that hits animals and sensies, it must have some effect on the brain. It doesn't make us wander off into the jungle, but Space knows what it does do to us.”
“You've lived with this thing for some time. What do people think it is?”
“Most of them think it's got something to do with the kerries. They seem to be the ones that benefit anyway. In the early days they sent men after the sensies of course. Mostly they had disappeared, and there were kerry tracks following theirs. We imported dogs, and fitted them with tracking devices. They got just outside the settlement, and the kerries killed them. We even got in a couple of elephants. It cost us the world, but they were too good for the kerries. They went for miles, and we tracked them on foot, by helicopter, and even had a ship in orbit.”
“What happened?”
“They tried to go in a straight line. Never saw anything so stupid. They damned near killed themselves fighting through jungle that they could have walked around, and then they ended up by walking over a cliff when they could have gone down a slope about twenty metres away. There were a couple of kerries there, and they might have spooked them over, anyway, we stopped trying to find the thing that way. We put a million creds reward out for anyone who could find and destroy it. Plenty of men have gone out, but no one has found anything, and so many haven't come back that most people are content to leave it alone. Every now and then someone desperate to get some cash goes out, but they're already failures from one cause or another, and most don't return. We've never had some one like you here before, however. You've got some soldier, or sports breeding in you, that's obvious, and you've been trained to hunt. It's just possible that you might have a chance. It would be dangerous, I make no secret of that, but the reward would be worth much to some one like you. Not only would you get the million, but I can grant you the pick of any land, not already taken up, to as high as a quarter of a million hectares. Think it over. I'll let you have enough to keep you going for a week while you have a look around and decide. If you do take it on, we'll fit you out with the best equipment available. If you don't want to, no doubt you'll be able to find work before the week's up. All the holdings are yelling out for labour. You'll have no difficulty there, I dare say.”
The Governor stood to terminate the interview, and held out his hand in the old fashioned gesture that had not survived the dark days on earth. Wolf did not take it. Instead he said, “I do not need time to think it over, Governor. Hunting is my trade. If this thing is beast, I'll find it. If it can be killed, I'll kill it, or it will kill me. You see, Governor, I am a sensitive, and, it seems, I must face this thing soon or late.”
“What! What! You can't be! They agreed! No sensitives, convicts or free men!” The governor sat back slowly on his chair, shock and amazement turning his seamed face blank. “Good God! It's a death sentence.”
“It was not known by the Judge.”
“Not known? How the space can that be? I thought you all had to be registered.”
“My people live in a very isolated part of the world, and our sensitive was an old man, and not well.”
“I see. Are you a listener or a sender?”
“I am both.”
“Well, if that's the case, why did you ask all those questions? Why didn't you just—”
“You are not a sender, Governor. To get information from your mind, I would have to read you. I could do that, but my people considered that unforgivable. It was lawful to kill a sensitive if you could prove he read you without your consent.”
“I see. I still cannot understand how they didn't pick you up at your trial. There must have been a sensitive there.”
“The trial was not an honest one. The girl, and her father, knew I was sensitive, and, of course, my people's sensitive did. Also I am a bit different to others. I can avoid listening and sending.”
“Avoid it: You mean you can shield?”
“I do not quite understand what is meant by ‘shield', but I think it must be something like that, yes.”
“Well, I'll be spaced! Did this girl and her father know that?”
“The girl should have. The others—I do not know.”
“You'd be the hottest property on Earth, and they send you here. Why? That is what I'd like to know.” The Governor stood up, but not to terminate the conversation this time. With rapid steps, he paced from one side of the room to the other, and back again. He stopped abruptly. “Tell me, when you're receiving, do you feel anything?”
“No, Governor. Actually, I tried to pick something up. All I felt was just good.”
“Good? What do you mean, Good?”
“Just that. Possibly it's the absence of senders or something. I do not know. I tried to pick up something, but there was nothing, and for some reason it gave me pleasure. Possibly it was just relief.”
“You felt no pull towards the north, north-east?”
“None whatever—in any direction. Is it possible that this thing only works at times?”
“With this thing, anything is possible: on the other hand, are you sure you really are a sensitive? This isn't some kind of a stunt to get a free passage back to Earth?”
Wolf laughed. “I do not particularly want to go back to Earth, Governor, and, if you want to test my ability, just think of any number between one, and a million.”
“Right.”
Wolf laughed again. “You are a cautious man, Governo
r. You are thinking very strongly of the letter, ‘Z'.”
The other smiled and relaxed. “You're a sensie all right. Uncomfortable sort of fellow to have around. I can see why your lot stirred up so much strife down there.”
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Chapter 6
Wolf sat in a worn armchair in the lounge section of a small government dwelling unit in the migrant reception building. It was sparsely furnished, and that old, but it was luxury compared to that which he had known at home. Through the thin walls, he could hear a child crying, and a man and woman arguing dispiritedly. From the other side came the sharp clanging of cooking utensils, and a woman's voice complaining bitterly that she had known it would be hard at first, but nobody had told her that they would have to do without common essentials such as television, and that she would be expected to wash things by hand in a trough.
The noise, in itself, did not worry Wolf, but it emphasised his loneliness. At home, though he had been isolated mentally, he had never been so, physically. As an unattached male, he had lived in the place of boys, and there had always been noise, and movement about him. Only on the hunt had he experienced true isolation, and that had been welcome, for there the trees and the life of the forests had been companions enough. The sterile area of the dwelling, small though it was, represented a desert to his mind, and he found it hard to relax.
He felt tired and listless. His meal of synthetic meat, and strange vegetables, had not helped. He felt alone amongst strangers, who did not understand, or wish to understand him. Earth, and his people, seemed far away indeed. The hunt he would have to undertake, seemed to offer only a lonely death.
To combat the depression, he opened his mind, intent on surveying the city as far as his seeing power could reach. Immediately, he felt better. The depression fell from his mind like an autumn leaf, and a feeling of well-being invaded his senses. He didn't reach out to survey the area, there seemed no longer need. He relaxed, and settled contentedly back in his chair. He had told the governor that, in receiving, he had experienced a sense of well-being, but he had not known it to be so immediate, or so potent. He cast about intently to try to discover some source, or compulsion, or allure, anything to give a clue to the fate of the sensitives, but there was nothing. He could not imagine the gentle sense of contentment causing anyone to do anything but enjoy life. It might not be conducive to hard work or great ambition, but to cause people to want to leave everything, and go to almost certain death—it just didn't seem possible. Something else must lurk to the north, north-east.
He began to think of the hunt again, but this time optimistically. If he could destroy the thing, he would be a rich man when he returned. If the Governor kept his promise, he would have a quarter of a million hectares, and be a very rich man indeed. He stood up, and adjusted his chair, and sat again. What would he do then? With a million creds, he could import cattle, others would be wary at first, he could get in early. He could mine—his awareness would penetrate land to a certain depth. Others had learned to locate mineral, so might he. He could even seek political power—there were no laws restricting sensitives on High America.
He stood up again, and dragged his chair a little way, and made himself comfortable again. Then he fell to dreaming once more, and gradually became sleepy. Darkness dropped across the face of the land, and a thunder storm built up against the sunset, and began to sweep across the western sky swinging towards the south.
Wolf stirred himself, and went to the door to watch the dome of cloud and stars, and the frenetic pulse of lightning until the storm broke across the lights of the city, and drove him inside. Then he arranged his bed to his liking and settled in. The sounds in the units about him were subdued by the violence of the rain and the crash of thunder. He closed his mind, and experienced a sudden disturbing sense of loss, but sleep was very near, and he drifted off.
He woke well before dawn. High America was much the same size as Earth, but had a slightly slower rate of rotation making the day closer to twenty-six hours. Wolf rose, and cooked a meagre breakfast, and had finished well before the sun rose. He went out to watch the dawn, and thrilled to the rising of the mists over the valleys of jungle. Parts of it looked so like home that his heart ached, and he wondered who was top hunter of his people now, and if a hunt was going on at that very moment. At last the sun lifted high enough for the warming air to soak up the mists like a giant sponge, and Wolf turned reluctantly back to the dwelling.
As he entered, he paused, and his blood ran suddenly coldly in his veins. Then he hurried forward. Everything had an unbalanced appearance. The chair he had been using, his bed, the place he had set at table, the utensils he had used, the clothes he had been given, everything he had touched since he had entered the rooms—all were as far to one side as they could be reasonably got, and that side was the north, north-east. He opened his mind, and felt the now familiar sense of pleasure, and the room suddenly lost its unbalanced appearance. In fact it looked right. He closed his mind, squeezed it tight, and perspiration broke out on his forehead, and fear made a sick little puddle of his breakfast.
Hurriedly, as though he feared some visitor would arrive to accuse him of an unspecified crime, he set to work to straighten the rooms. Then he sat once more in the chair, and decided that, good feeling or not, his mind would stay closed unless he had great need of listening.
Most of the day was spent in preparing for the hunt. In the morning he was taken to a range to learn the handling of the particular type of laser weapon developed on High America. They were shorter than the conventional ones, and lighter, but had a greater range with a killing accuracy to over a kilometre, necessary, he was told, because of the speed of the attacking burst of a kerry, and a total range of almost four kilometres. Wolf easily matched the skill of the young High American who demonstrated the weapon, but he did not think much of it for hunting. It made a sharp hiss, and the beam was visible even in bright light, but worse still was the scent of burning a hit would send out, and all animals reacted instantly to such a smell. He would carry one, but preferred a hand blaster for defence, and a spear for general hunting.
He spent all afternoon making a hunting spear. In the afternoon he returned to his rooms tired once more. The extra hours of daylight told on him more than he had expected. The prolonged sunlight allowed heat to build up to an oppressive level despite the altitude of the plateau, and the air was humid. There was no cooling system in his rooms except for a fan that tiredly stirred the heated air. He took a shower, and ate his processed food cold, but almost as soon as he had settled in his chair, his back became wet with sweat. Without thinking, he opened his mind, and immediately felt comfortable. It was as though his mind had suddenly become divorced completely from the discomfort of his physical being. It was only with an effort that he shut out that pleasure. All evening it nagged at him, the knowledge that he could find comfort so easily. Only years of training, the patience of the hunter, and the out-people's habits of austerity allowed him to fight it without being greatly inconvenienced. When he realised that the air was cooling with the setting of the sun, and the development of the rains, he felt a sense of pride, and achievement. At least to a small degree, he had defeated the thing, whatever it was. So long as he remained healthy, and in possession of his reason, there seemed no great danger to him, in the city at least.
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Chapter 7
“Where the hell is he then?” Leeli Pa'Lar stamped her foot and screamed with frustration. For five days she had chased over the planet looking for her father. Always she had been met with blank and sullen faces. None of her father's employees knew where he was, and, when she ruthlessly dredged their minds, she felt their resentment building to the borders of hate. Normally, she enjoyed the impotent fury she stirred in the minds of the men about her. It gave her a sense of power to feel their hate, and to know their desperate attempts to deaden it when they kne
w she was raping their minds. Now and then she found the hate swelling dangerously close to a state of loss of control. Then her father got rid of the hapless victim, and the others knew the reason, and feared her all the more, and she gloated for all to see.
In times of emergency, however, it was a disadvantage. She knew she would get no active co-operation. Even vast bribes won only token aid. Her father had berated her, time and time again, for her treatment of his people, but she could not help the contempt she felt for all nonsensitives, and the power she wielded over them, and their fear of her, gave her a pleasure that she could not forego.
She had got word from one of her father's associates, that he had returned to their headquarters in the far north of USNCA, where the cold was so severe, and so prolonged, that they could live almost free of disruption from senders. It was rumoured that the few senders living in the region when Papa Pa'Lar had bought in had suffered strange, and fatal accidents. Nothing had been proved, however, for anyone so brash as to dredge Papa's mind would undoubtedly find his death warrant there.
The men had no reason to lie to her, had not been lying in fact, but her father was not there, and his employees did not know where to find him. She could not help raging, and the pleasure she read in their minds as they realised the extent of her frustration, drove her to greater fury. A couple she marked down for elimination, but even the contemplation of their future dismay, terror, agony, and destruction, was no balm for the anger that choked her. It was as though her father was avoiding her. Suddenly she grew suspicious of the whole dance thing. It had been merely a pretext to get the mineral feelers into the lands of the Out-people. They had found nothing worthwhile. Not often was her father wrong. Had the whole thing been only an elaborate means of getting her out of the way? Had she fallen for a simple ruse like a clod of a nonsensitive? Fury almost drove her insane.
“Find him!” she screamed. “Find him, now! Or, by God! I'll have every one of you cut until you're worse than zombies! Do—” Then it hit her.