The 38th Golden Age of Science Fiction MEGAPACK

by Chester S. Geier

  “Jon, I was thinking—Perhaps this isn’t the right planet. Perhaps…perhaps old Mark Gaynor and the Purists never landed here at all—Jon Gaynor shook his brown head slowly. He was a tall, lean figure in a tight-fitting, slate-gray overall. “I’ve considered that possibility, Wade. No—this is the place, all right. Everything checks against the data given in that old Bureau of Expeditions report. Seven planets in the system—this the second planet. And this world fits perfectly the description given in the report—almost a second Earth. Then there’s the sun. Its type, density, rate of radiation, spectrum—all the rest—they check, too.”

  Gaynor shook his head again. “Granted there could exist another system of seven planets, with the second habitable. But it’s too much to suppose that the description of that second planet, as well as the description of its sun, would exactly fit the expedition report. And the report mentioned a deserted city. We’re standing in the middle of it now. The only thing that doesn’t check is that it’s still deserted.”

  Harlan gave a slight shrug. “That may not mean anything, Jon. How can you be certain that Mark Gaynor and the Purists came here at all? The only clue you have is that old Bureau of Expeditions report, describing this city and planet, which you found among the personal effects Mark Gaynor left behind. It may not have meant anything.”

  “Perhaps—But I’m pretty sure it did. You see, old Mark and the Purists wanted to live far from all others, somewhere where there would be none to laugh at them for their faith in the ancient religious beliefs. The only habitable planets which answered their purposes were a tremendously remote few. Of them all, this was the only one possessing a city—and a deserted city at that.”

  “So you think they must have come here because of the benefits offered by the city?”

  “That’s one reason. The other…well, old Mark had a pile of Bureau of Expedition reports dating back for two hundred years. The report relating to this planetary system was marked in red, as being of special interest. It was the only report so marked—Harlan smiled in friendly derision. “Add that to a misplaced hero-worship for a crackpot ancestor—and the answer is that we’ve come on a goose chase. Lord, Jon even with the Hyperspacial Drive to carry us back over the immense distance, it’s going to be a terrific job getting back to Earth. You know what a time we had, finding this planet. The Hyperspacial Drive is a wonderful thing—but it has its drawbacks. You go in here, and you come out there—millions of miles away. If you’re lucky, you’re only within a few million miles or so of your destination. If not—and that’s most of the time—you simply try again. And again—”

  “That’s a small worry,” Gaynor replied. “And as for old Mark, he was hardly a crackpot. It took one hundred and twenty years for the world to realize that. His ideas on how people should live and think were fine—but they just didn’t fit in with the general scheme of things.

  On a small group, they could have been applied beautifully. And such a group, living and thinking that way, might have risen to limitless heights of greatness. Hero-worship? No—I never had such feelings for my great-great-uncle, Mark Gaynor. I just had a feverish desire to see how far the Purists had risen—to see if their way of life had given them an advantage over others.”

  Harlan was sober. “Maybe we’ll never learn what happened to them, Jon. The city is deserted. Either the Purists came here and left—or they never came here at all.”

  Gaynor straightened with purpose. “We’ll learn which is the answer. I’m not leaving until we do. We’ll—”

  Gaynor broke off, his eyes jerking toward the sky. High up and far away in the blue, something moved, a vast swarm of objects too tiny for identification. They soared and circled, dipped and swooped like birds. And as the two men from another planet watched, sounds drifted down to them—sweet, crystalline tinklings and chimings, so infinitely faint that they seemed to be sensed rather than heard.

  “Life—” Harlan murmured. “There’s life here of sorts, Jon.”

  Gaynor nodded thoughtfully. “And that may mean danger. We’re going to examine the city—and I think we’d better be armed.”

  While Harlan watched the graceful, aimless maneuvers of the aerial creatures, Gaynor went back into the ship. In a moment, he returned with laden arms. He and Harlan strapped the antigravity flight units to their backs, buckled the positron blasters about their waists. Then they lifted into the air, soared with easy speed toward a cluster of glowing towers.

  As they flew, a small cloud of the aerial creatures flashed past. The things seemed to be intelligent, for, as though catching sight of the two men, they suddenly changed course, circling with a clearly evident display of excited curiosity. The crystalline chimings and tinklings which they emitted held an elfin note of astonishment.

  If astonishment it actually was, Gaynor and Harlan were equally amazed at close view of the creatures. For they were great, faceted crystals whose interiors flamed with glorious color—exquisite rainbow shades that pulsed and changed with the throb of life. Like a carillon of crystal bells, their chimings and tinklings rang out—so infinitely sweet and clear and plaintive that it was both a pain and a pleasure to hear.

  “Crystalline life!” Harlan exclaimed. His voice became thoughtful. “Wonder if it’s the only kind of life here.”

  Gaynor said nothing. He watched the circling crystal creatures with wary eyes, the positron blaster gripped in his hand. But the things gave no evidence of being inimical—or at least no evidence of being immediately so. With a last exquisite burst of chimings, they coalesced into a small cloud and soared away, glittering, flashing, with prismatic splendor in the sunlight. On the invisible wings of their antigravity flight units, Gaynor and Harlan had approached quite close to the cluster of towers which was their goal. Gliding finally through the space between two, they found themselves within a snug, circular enclosure, about the circumference of which the towers were spaced. The floor of the enclosure was in effect a tiny park, for grass and trees grew here, and there were shaded walks built of the same palely glowing substance as the towers. In the exact center of the place was a fountain, wrought of some lustrous, silvery metal. Only a thin trickle of water came from it now.

  Gaynor dipped down, landed gently beside the fountain. He bent, peering, then gestured excitedly to Harlan, who was hovering close.

  “Wade—there’s a bas-relief around this thing! Figures—”

  Harlan touched ground, joined Gaynor in a tense scrutiny of the design. A procession of strange, lithe beings were pictured in bas-relief around the curving base of the fountain. Their forms were essentially humanoid, possessed of two arms, two legs, and large, well-formed head. Except for an exotic, fawnlike quality about the graceful, parading figures, Gaynor and Harlan might have been gazing at a depiction of garlanded, terrestrial youths and maidens.

  “The builders of the city,” Gaynor said softly. “They looked a lot like us. Parallel evolution, maybe. This planet and sun are almost twins of ours. Wade—I wonder what happened to them?”

  Harlan shook his shock of red hair slowly, saying nothing. His blue eyes were dark with somber speculation.

  Gaynor’s voice whispered on. “The city was already deserted when that government expedition discovered it some one hundred and thirty years ago. The city couldn’t always have been that way. Once there were people on this planet—beings who thought and moved and dreamed, who built in material things an edifice symbolic of their dreaming. Why did they disappear? What could have been responsible? War, disease—or simply the dying out of a race?”

  Harlan shrugged his great shoulders uncomfortably. His voice was gruff. “Maybe the answer is here somewhere. Maybe not. If it isn’t, maybe we’ll be better off, not knowing. When an entire race disappears for no apparent reason, as the people of this city seem to have done, the answer usually isn’t a nice one.”

  The two men took to one of the paths radiating away from the
fountain, followed it to a great, arching entrance way at the base of a tower building. Slowly they entered—the sunlight dimmed and they moved through a soft gloom. Presently they found themselves in a vast foyer—if such it was. In the middle of the place was a circular dais, with steps leading to a small platform at the top.

  They mounted the steps, gained the platform. Of a sudden, a faint whispering grew, and without any other warning, they began to rise slowly into the air. Harlan released a cry of surprise and shock. Gaynor ripped his positron blaster free, sought desperately to writhe from the influence of the force that had gripped him.

  And then Gaynor quieted. His eyes were bright with a realization. “An elevator!” he gasped. “Wade—we stepped into some kind of elevating force.”

  They ceased struggling and were borne gently up and up. They passed through an opening in the ceiling of the foyer, found themselves within a circular shaft, the top of which was lost in the dimness above. Vertical handrails lined the shaft. It was only after passing two floors that they divined the purpose of these. Then, reaching the third floor, each gripped a handrail, and they stepped from the force.

  They found themselves within a vast, well-lighted apartment. The source of illumination was not apparent, seeming to emanate from the very walls. Room opened after spacious room—and each was as utterly barren of furnishings as the last. Barren, that is, except for two things. The first was that the walls were covered with murals or paintings—life-sized, rich with glowing color, and almost photographic in detail. The second was that one wall of each room contained a tiny niche. Gaynor and Harlan investigated a niche in one room they entered. Within it was a solitary object—a large jewel, or at least what seemed to be a jewel.

  “This is screwy,” Harlan muttered. “It doesn’t make sense. How could anyone have lived in a place like this?”

  Gaynor’s eyes were dark with thought. He answered slowly, “Don’t make the mistake of judging things here according to our standard of culture. To the builders of the city, Wade, these rooms might have been thoroughly cozy and comfortable, containing every essential necessary to their daily lives.”

  “Maybe,” Harlan grunted. “But I certainly don’t see those essentials.”

  “This thing—” Gaynor lifted the jewel from its niche. “Maybe this thing holds an answer of some kind.” Gaynor balanced the jewel in his palm, gazing down at it frowningly. His thoughts were wondering, speculative. Then the speculation faded—he found himself concentrating on the thing, as though by sheer force of will he could fathom its purpose.

  And then it happened—the jewel grew cold in his hand—a faint, rose-colored glow surrounded it like an aura. A musical tinkling sounded. Harlan jumped, a yell bursting full-throated from his lungs. Gaynor spun about, surprised, uncomprehending.

  “I…I saw things!” Harlan husked. “Objects, Jon—The room was full of them—angular ghosts!”

  Gaynor stared at the other without speaking. His features were lax with a dawning awe.

  Harlan said suddenly, “Try it again, Jon. Look at that thing. Maybe—”

  Gaynor returned his gaze to the jewel. He forced his mind quiet, concentrated. Again the jewel grew cold, and again the tinkling sounded. Harlan was tense, rigid, his narrowed eyes probing the room. Within the room, outlines wavered mistily—outlines of things which might have been strange furniture, or queer, angular machines.

  “Harder, Jon! Harder!” Harlan prompted.

  Gaynor was sweating. He could feel the perspiration roll down his temples. His eyes seemed to be popping from their sockets.

  Harlan strained with his peering. The outlines grew stronger, darkened—but only for a moment. The next they wavered mistily again, thinned, and were gone.

  Gaynor drew a sobbing breath, straightened up. He asked, “Wade—what did you see?”

  “I don’t know for sure. Things—or the ghosts of things. Here—give me that. I’m going to see what I can do.”

  Gaynor relinquished the jewel. Holding it in his palm, Harlan gathered his thoughts, poised them, focused them. And, watching, Gaynor saw the ghostly outlines for the first time—misty suggestions of angles and curves, hints of forms whose purpose he could not guess. Alien ghosts of alien objects, summoned by will from some alien limbo.

  Abruptly, the outlines faded and were gone. The tinkling of the jewel thinned and died.

  Harlan drew a shuddering breath. “Jon—you saw them?”

  “Yes. Dimly.”

  “We…we haven’t got the strength, Jon. We haven’t got the power necessary to materialize the objects—whatever they are.”

  “Maybe that’s the drawback. Or—maybe we’ve got the strength, but simply can’t materialize things—objects—whose size, shape, and purpose we do not know and cannot guess.”

  “That might be it.” Harlan’s voice grew sharp. “But, great space, Jon, what possibly could be the idea behind it? Why did they—that other race—construct buildings in which the rooms were left unfurnished, or which could be furnished merely by concentrating on…on these jewels? What could have been the reason behind it?”

  Gaynor shook his head. “We’ll never know that, perhaps. At least, we’ll never know if we persist in thinking in terms of our own culture. The builders of this city were humanoid, Wade—but mentally they were alien. Don’t forget that. These rooms may not have been living quarters at all. They may have been repositories for valuable things, of which the jewels were the means of materializing. Only those who knew how could materialize them. Thus, perhaps, those things were kept safe.”

  “That might be it,” Harlan muttered. “It makes sense.”

  “These pictures”—Gaynor gestured at the paintings on the walls—“might contain the answer. If we knew how to read them, they might tell us the purpose of these empty rooms—why the furnishings or machines had to be materialized. I wonder, Wade…I wonder if each of these pictures is complete in itself, or if each is part of a greater series. You know—like a book. You read one page, and it doesn’t make sense. You read the whole thing—and it does.”

  “The beginning, Jon,” Harlan whispered. “We’d have to start at the beginning.”

  “Yes—the beginning.”

  Harlan replaced the jewel in its niche, and on the invisible wings of their antigravity flight units, they glided back to the force shaft. Here they switched off their units, allowed the force to carry them up. But the apartments on the upper floors contained nothing new or illuminating. Like the first they had visited, these were empty, save for the wall paintings and the jewels in their niches. They returned to the shaft again, this time to meet a complication.

  “Say—how do we get down?” Harlan puzzled. “This thing has been carrying us up all the time, and there doesn’t seem to be another one for descending.”

  “Why, you simply will yourself to go down,” Gaynor said. Then he looked blankly surprised.

  Harlan nodded gravely. “Of course,” he said. “That’s the answer. I should have thought of it myself.”

  They descended. Outside, the sun was bright and warm. Under its light the city dreamed on.

  Gaynor and Harlan soared through the warmth. The city was very bright and still. Far away and high in the blue, glittering swarms of the crystal creatures darted. Their tinkling and chiming drifted down to the two men.

  Gaynor and Harlan descended several times to investigate tower buildings, but these were very much like the first they had visited. The spacious apartments seemed to echo in their strange emptiness, each one seemingly louder than the last. Twice they took turns, attempted to materialize the unguessable furnishings of the rooms. Each time they failed. And afterward they did not disturb the jewels in their niches. They merely gazed at the flaming wall paintings, and came away.

  Again they glided through the air, though slowly and thoughtfully, now. They were silent. Beneath them, the city dreamed. Onc
e a cloud of crystal creatures flashed past, sparkling, chiming, but the two did not seem to notice.

  “Jon—?” Harlan’s voice was hesitant.

  “Yes?”

  “I don’t know how to put it into words, but—well, don’t you feel, that you are beginning to know?”

  “Yes—there’s the ghost of something in my mind. Those pictures, Wade—”

  “Yes, Jon, the pictures.”

  Again they were silent. Gaynor broke the silence.

  “Wade—all my life I’ve been reading primers. Someone just gave me a college textbook, and I glanced through several pages. Naturally, I did not understand, but here and there I found words familiar to me. They left a ghost in my mind—”

  “You’ve got to go back to the beginning, Jon. You’ve got to read all the books which will help you to understand that college textbook.”

  “Yes, Wade, the beginning—”

  They drifted on while the city dreamed beneath them. The sun was a swaddling blanket of brightness. Like memory-sounds, faint chimings and tinklings wafted on the air.

  And then Gaynor was grasping Harlan’s arm. “Wade—down there. Look!” He pointed tensely.

  Harlan stiffened as he saw it. The ship was a tiny thing, almost lost amid the greenery of the park. Almost in unison, the two touched the controls of their antigravity flight units, arrowed down in a swift, gentle arc.

  The ship was very big, like no ship they had ever seen before. It was a thing of harsh angles, built of some strange red metal or alloy that gleamed in the sunlight with the hue of blood. A square opening gaped in its side. Slowly, Gaynor and Harlan entered it.

  It was as though they entered the gloom of another world. Little of what they saw was familiar to them, and they had to guess the purpose of the rest. There were passageways and corridors, and rooms opened from these. A few they were able to identify, but the rest, filled with queer, angular furniture and sprawling machines, escaped classification. They left the ship—and the sunlight felt good.