feat: Turfu

Dickish/data/pg28554.txt

+ _The slovenly wub might well have said: Many men
+   talk like philosophers and live like fools._
+
+
+They had almost finished with the loading. Outside stood the Optus, his
+arms folded, his face sunk in gloom. Captain Franco walked leisurely
+down the gangplank, grinning.
+
+"What's the matter?" he said. "You're getting paid for all this."
+
+The Optus said nothing. He turned away, collecting his robes. The
+Captain put his boot on the hem of the robe.
+
+"Just a minute. Don't go off. I'm not finished."
+
+"Oh?" The Optus turned with dignity. "I am going back to the village."
+He looked toward the animals and birds being driven up the gangplank
+into the spaceship. "I must organize new hunts."
+
+Franco lit a cigarette. "Why not? You people can go out into the veldt
+and track it all down again. But when we run out halfway between Mars
+and Earth--"
+
+The Optus went off, wordless. Franco joined the first mate at the bottom
+of the gangplank.
+
+"How's it coming?" he said. He looked at his watch. "We got a good
+bargain here."
+
+The mate glanced at him sourly. "How do you explain that?"
+
+"What's the matter with you? We need it more than they do."
+
+"I'll see you later, Captain." The mate threaded his way up the plank,
+between the long-legged Martian go-birds, into the ship. Franco watched
+him disappear. He was just starting up after him, up the plank toward
+the port, when he saw _it_.
+
+"My God!" He stood staring, his hands on his hips. Peterson was walking
+along the path, his face red, leading _it_ by a string.
+
+"I'm sorry, Captain," he said, tugging at the string. Franco walked
+toward him.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+The wub stood sagging, its great body settling slowly. It was sitting
+down, its eyes half shut. A few flies buzzed about its flank, and it
+switched its tail.
+
+_It_ sat. There was silence.
+
+"It's a wub," Peterson said. "I got it from a native for fifty cents. He
+said it was a very unusual animal. Very respected."
+
+"This?" Franco poked the great sloping side of the wub. "It's a pig! A
+huge dirty pig!"
+
+"Yes sir, it's a pig. The natives call it a wub."
+
+"A huge pig. It must weigh four hundred pounds." Franco grabbed a tuft
+of the rough hair. The wub gasped. Its eyes opened, small and moist.
+Then its great mouth twitched.
+
+A tear rolled down the wub's cheek and splashed on the floor.
+
+"Maybe it's good to eat," Peterson said nervously.
+
+"We'll soon find out," Franco said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The wub survived the take-off, sound asleep in the hold of the ship.
+When they were out in space and everything was running smoothly, Captain
+Franco bade his men fetch the wub upstairs so that he might perceive
+what manner of beast it was.
+
+The wub grunted and wheezed, squeezing up the passageway.
+
+"Come on," Jones grated, pulling at the rope. The wub twisted, rubbing
+its skin off on the smooth chrome walls. It burst into the ante-room,
+tumbling down in a heap. The men leaped up.
+
+"Good Lord," French said. "What is it?"
+
+"Peterson says it's a wub," Jones said. "It belongs to him." He kicked
+at the wub. The wub stood up unsteadily, panting.
+
+"What's the matter with it?" French came over. "Is it going to be sick?"
+
+They watched. The wub rolled its eyes mournfully. It gazed around at the
+men.
+
+"I think it's thirsty," Peterson said. He went to get some water. French
+shook his head.
+
+"No wonder we had so much trouble taking off. I had to reset all my
+ballast calculations."
+
+Peterson came back with the water. The wub began to lap gratefully,
+splashing the men.
+
+Captain Franco appeared at the door.
+
+"Let's have a look at it." He advanced, squinting critically. "You got
+this for fifty cents?"
+
+"Yes, sir," Peterson said. "It eats almost anything. I fed it on grain
+and it liked that. And then potatoes, and mash, and scraps from the
+table, and milk. It seems to enjoy eating. After it eats it lies down
+and goes to sleep."
+
+"I see," Captain Franco said. "Now, as to its taste. That's the real
+question. I doubt if there's much point in fattening it up any more. It
+seems fat enough to me already. Where's the cook? I want him here. I
+want to find out--"
+
+The wub stopped lapping and looked up at the Captain.
+
+"Really, Captain," the wub said. "I suggest we talk of other matters."
+
+The room was silent.
+
+"What was that?" Franco said. "Just now."
+
+"The wub, sir," Peterson said. "It spoke."
+
+They all looked at the wub.
+
+"What did it say? What did it say?"
+
+"It suggested we talk about other things."
+
+Franco walked toward the wub. He went all around it, examining it from
+every side. Then he came back over and stood with the men.
+
+"I wonder if there's a native inside it," he said thoughtfully. "Maybe
+we should open it up and have a look."
+
+"Oh, goodness!" the wub cried. "Is that all you people can think of,
+killing and cutting?"
+
+Franco clenched his fists. "Come out of there! Whoever you are, come
+out!"
+
+Nothing stirred. The men stood together, their faces blank, staring at
+the wub. The wub swished its tail. It belched suddenly.
+
+"I beg your pardon," the wub said.
+
+"I don't think there's anyone in there," Jones said in a low voice. They
+all looked at each other.
+
+The cook came in.
+
+"You wanted me, Captain?" he said. "What's this thing?"
+
+"This is a wub," Franco said. "It's to be eaten. Will you measure it and
+figure out--"
+
+"I think we should have a talk," the wub said. "I'd like to discuss this
+with you, Captain, if I might. I can see that you and I do not agree on
+some basic issues."
+
+The Captain took a long time to answer. The wub waited good-naturedly,
+licking the water from its jowls.
+
+"Come into my office," the Captain said at last. He turned and walked
+out of the room. The wub rose and padded after him. The men watched it
+go out. They heard it climbing the stairs.
+
+"I wonder what the outcome will be," the cook said. "Well, I'll be in
+the kitchen. Let me know as soon as you hear."
+
+"Sure," Jones said. "Sure."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The wub eased itself down in the corner with a sigh. "You must forgive
+me," it said. "I'm afraid I'm addicted to various forms of relaxation.
+When one is as large as I--"
+
+The Captain nodded impatiently. He sat down at his desk and folded his
+hands.
+
+"All right," he said. "Let's get started. You're a wub? Is that
+correct?"
+
+The wub shrugged. "I suppose so. That's what they call us, the natives,
+I mean. We have our own term."
+
+"And you speak English? You've been in contact with Earthmen before?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then how do you do it?"
+
+"Speak English? Am I speaking English? I'm not conscious of speaking
+anything in particular. I examined your mind--"
+
+"My mind?"
+
+"I studied the contents, especially the semantic warehouse, as I refer
+to it--"
+
+"I see," the Captain said. "Telepathy. Of course."
+
+"We are a very old race," the wub said. "Very old and very ponderous. It
+is difficult for us to move around. You can appreciate that anything so
+slow and heavy would be at the mercy of more agile forms of life. There
+was no use in our relying on physical defenses. How could we win? Too
+heavy to run, too soft to fight, too good-natured to hunt for game--"
+
+"How do you live?"
+
+"Plants. Vegetables. We can eat almost anything. We're very catholic.
+Tolerant, eclectic, catholic. We live and let live. That's how we've
+gotten along."
+
+The wub eyed the Captain.
+
+"And that's why I so violently objected to this business about having me
+boiled. I could see the image in your mind--most of me in the frozen
+food locker, some of me in the kettle, a bit for your pet cat--"
+
+"So you read minds?" the Captain said. "How interesting. Anything else?
+I mean, what else can you do along those lines?"
+
+"A few odds and ends," the wub said absently, staring around the room.
+"A nice apartment you have here, Captain. You keep it quite neat. I
+respect life-forms that are tidy. Some Martian birds are quite tidy.
+They throw things out of their nests and sweep them--"
+
+"Indeed." The Captain nodded. "But to get back to the problem--"
+
+"Quite so. You spoke of dining on me. The taste, I am told, is good. A
+little fatty, but tender. But how can any lasting contact be established
+between your people and mine if you resort to such barbaric attitudes?
+Eat me? Rather you should discuss questions with me, philosophy, the
+arts--"
+
+The Captain stood up. "Philosophy. It might interest you to know that we
+will be hard put to find something to eat for the next month. An
+unfortunate spoilage--"
+
+"I know." The wub nodded. "But wouldn't it be more in accord with your
+principles of democracy if we all drew straws, or something along that
+line? After all, democracy is to protect the minority from just such
+infringements. Now, if each of us casts one vote--"
+
+The Captain walked to the door.
+
+"Nuts to you," he said. He opened the door. He opened his mouth.
+
+He stood frozen, his mouth wide, his eyes staring, his fingers still on
+the knob.
+
+The wub watched him. Presently it padded out of the room, edging past
+the Captain. It went down the hall, deep in meditation.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The room was quiet.
+
+"So you see," the wub said, "we have a common myth. Your mind contains
+many familiar myth symbols. Ishtar, Odysseus--"
+
+Peterson sat silently, staring at the floor. He shifted in his chair.
+
+"Go on," he said. "Please go on."
+
+"I find in your Odysseus a figure common to the mythology of most
+self-conscious races. As I interpret it, Odysseus wanders as an
+individual, aware of himself as such. This is the idea of separation, of
+separation from family and country. The process of individuation."
+
+"But Odysseus returns to his home." Peterson looked out the port window,
+at the stars, endless stars, burning intently in the empty universe.
+"Finally he goes home."
+
+"As must all creatures. The moment of separation is a temporary period,
+a brief journey of the soul. It begins, it ends. The wanderer returns to
+land and race...."
+
+The door opened. The wub stopped, turning its great head.
+
+Captain Franco came into the room, the men behind him. They hesitated at
+the door.
+
+"Are you all right?" French said.
+
+"Do you mean me?" Peterson said, surprised. "Why me?"
+
+Franco lowered his gun. "Come over here," he said to Peterson. "Get up
+and come here."
+
+There was silence.
+
+"Go ahead," the wub said. "It doesn't matter."
+
+Peterson stood up. "What for?"
+
+"It's an order."
+
+Peterson walked to the door. French caught his arm.
+
+"What's going on?" Peterson wrenched loose. "What's the matter with
+you?"
+
+Captain Franco moved toward the wub. The wub looked up from where it lay
+in the corner, pressed against the wall.
+
+"It is interesting," the wub said, "that you are obsessed with the idea
+of eating me. I wonder why."
+
+"Get up," Franco said.
+
+"If you wish." The wub rose, grunting. "Be patient. It is difficult for
+me." It stood, gasping, its tongue lolling foolishly.
+
+"Shoot it now," French said.
+
+"For God's sake!" Peterson exclaimed. Jones turned to him quickly, his
+eyes gray with fear.
+
+"You didn't see him--like a statue, standing there, his mouth open. If
+we hadn't come down, he'd still be there."
+
+"Who? The Captain?" Peterson stared around. "But he's all right now."
+
+They looked at the wub, standing in the middle of the room, its great
+chest rising and falling.
+
+"Come on," Franco said. "Out of the way."
+
+The men pulled aside toward the door.
+
+"You are quite afraid, aren't you?" the wub said. "Have I done anything
+to you? I am against the idea of hurting. All I have done is try to
+protect myself. Can you expect me to rush eagerly to my death? I am a
+sensible being like yourselves. I was curious to see your ship, learn
+about you. I suggested to the native--"
+
+The gun jerked.
+
+"See," Franco said. "I thought so."
+
+The wub settled down, panting. It put its paw out, pulling its tail
+around it.
+
+"It is very warm," the wub said. "I understand that we are close to the
+jets. Atomic power. You have done many wonderful things with
+it--technically. Apparently, your scientific hierarchy is not equipped
+to solve moral, ethical--"
+
+Franco turned to the men, crowding behind him, wide-eyed, silent.
+
+"I'll do it. You can watch."
+
+French nodded. "Try to hit the brain. It's no good for eating. Don't hit
+the chest. If the rib cage shatters, we'll have to pick bones out."
+
+"Listen," Peterson said, licking his lips. "Has it done anything? What
+harm has it done? I'm asking you. And anyhow, it's still mine. You have
+no right to shoot it. It doesn't belong to you."
+
+Franco raised his gun.
+
+"I'm going out," Jones said, his face white and sick. "I don't want to
+see it."
+
+"Me, too," French said. The men straggled out, murmuring. Peterson
+lingered at the door.
+
+"It was talking to me about myths," he said. "It wouldn't hurt anyone."
+
+He went outside.
+
+Franco walked toward the wub. The wub looked up slowly. It swallowed.
+
+"A very foolish thing," it said. "I am sorry that you want to do it.
+There was a parable that your Saviour related--"
+
+It stopped, staring at the gun.
+
+"Can you look me in the eye and do it?" the wub said. "Can you do that?"
+
+The Captain gazed down. "I can look you in the eye," he said. "Back on
+the farm we had hogs, dirty razor-back hogs. I can do it."
+
+Staring down at the wub, into the gleaming, moist eyes, he pressed the
+trigger.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The taste was excellent.
+
+They sat glumly around the table, some of them hardly eating at all. The
+only one who seemed to be enjoying himself was Captain Franco.
+
+"More?" he said, looking around. "More? And some wine, perhaps."
+
+"Not me," French said. "I think I'll go back to the chart room."
+
+"Me, too." Jones stood up, pushing his chair back. "I'll see you later."
+
+The Captain watched them go. Some of the others excused themselves.
+
+"What do you suppose the matter is?" the Captain said. He turned to
+Peterson. Peterson sat staring down at his plate, at the potatoes, the
+green peas, and at the thick slab of tender, warm meat.
+
+He opened his mouth. No sound came.
+
+The Captain put his hand on Peterson's shoulder.
+
+"It is only organic matter, now," he said. "The life essence is gone."
+He ate, spooning up the gravy with some bread. "I, myself, love to eat.
+It is one of the greatest things that a living creature can enjoy.
+Eating, resting, meditation, discussing things."
+
+Peterson nodded. Two more men got up and went out. The Captain drank
+some water and sighed.
+
+"Well," he said. "I must say that this was a very enjoyable meal. All
+the reports I had heard were quite true--the taste of wub. Very fine.
+But I was prevented from enjoying this pleasure in times past."
+
+He dabbed at his lips with his napkin and leaned back in his chair.
+Peterson stared dejectedly at the table.
+
+The Captain watched him intently. He leaned over.
+
+"Come, come," he said. "Cheer up! Let's discuss things."
+
+He smiled.
+
+"As I was saying before I was interrupted, the role of Odysseus in the
+myths--"
+
+Peterson jerked up, staring.
+
+"To go on," the Captain said. "Odysseus, as I understand him--"
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/data/pg29132.txt

+    _Nothing moved or stirred. Everything was silent, dead. Only the gun
+    showed signs of life ... and the trespassers had wrecked that for
+    all time. The return journey to pick up the treasure would be a
+    cinch ... they smiled._
+
+
+The Captain peered into the eyepiece of the telescope. He adjusted the
+focus quickly.
+
+"It was an atomic fission we saw, all right," he said presently. He
+sighed and pushed the eyepiece away. "Any of you who wants to look may
+do so. But it's not a pretty sight."
+
+"Let me look," Tance the archeologist said. He bent down to look,
+squinting. "Good Lord!" He leaped violently back, knocking against
+Dorle, the Chief Navigator.
+
+"Why did we come all this way, then?" Dorle asked, looking around at the
+other men. "There's no point even in landing. Let's go back at once."
+
+"Perhaps he's right," the biologist murmured. "But I'd like to look for
+myself, if I may." He pushed past Tance and peered into the sight.
+
+He saw a vast expanse, an endless surface of gray, stretching to the
+edge of the planet. At first he thought it was water but after a moment
+he realized that it was slag, pitted, fused slag, broken only by hills
+of rock jutting up at intervals. Nothing moved or stirred. Everything
+was silent, dead.
+
+"I see," Fomar said, backing away from the eyepiece. "Well, I won't find
+any legumes there." He tried to smile, but his lips stayed unmoved. He
+stepped away and stood by himself, staring past the others.
+
+"I wonder what the atmospheric sample will show," Tance said.
+
+"I think I can guess," the Captain answered. "Most of the atmosphere is
+poisoned. But didn't we expect all this? I don't see why we're so
+surprised. A fission visible as far away as our system must be a
+terrible thing."
+
+He strode off down the corridor, dignified and expressionless. They
+watched him disappear into the control room.
+
+As the Captain closed the door the young woman turned. "What did the
+telescope show? Good or bad?"
+
+"Bad. No life could possibly exist. Atmosphere poisoned, water
+vaporized, all the land fused."
+
+"Could they have gone underground?"
+
+The Captain slid back the port window so that the surface of the planet
+under them was visible. The two of them stared down, silent and
+disturbed. Mile after mile of unbroken ruin stretched out, blackened
+slag, pitted and scarred, and occasional heaps of rock.
+
+Suddenly Nasha jumped. "Look! Over there, at the edge. Do you see it?"
+
+They stared. Something rose up, not rock, not an accidental formation.
+It was round, a circle of dots, white pellets on the dead skin of the
+planet. A city? Buildings of some kind?
+
+"Please turn the ship," Nasha said excitedly. She pushed her dark hair
+from her face. "Turn the ship and let's see what it is!"
+
+The ship turned, changing its course. As they came over the white dots
+the Captain lowered the ship, dropping it down as much as he dared.
+"Piers," he said. "Piers of some sort of stone. Perhaps poured
+artificial stone. The remains of a city."
+
+"Oh, dear," Nasha murmured. "How awful." She watched the ruins disappear
+behind them. In a half-circle the white squares jutted from the slag,
+chipped and cracked, like broken teeth.
+
+"There's nothing alive," the Captain said at last. "I think we'll go
+right back; I know most of the crew want to. Get the Government
+Receiving Station on the sender and tell them what we found, and that
+we--"
+
+[Illustration]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He staggered.
+
+The first atomic shell had struck the ship, spinning it around. The
+Captain fell to the floor, crashing into the control table. Papers and
+instruments rained down on him. As he started to his feet the second
+shell struck. The ceiling cracked open, struts and girders twisted and
+bent. The ship shuddered, falling suddenly down, then righting itself as
+automatic controls took over.
+
+The Captain lay on the floor by the smashed control board. In the corner
+Nasha struggled to free herself from the debris.
+
+Outside the men were already sealing the gaping leaks in the side of the
+ship, through which the precious air was rushing, dissipating into the
+void beyond. "Help me!" Dorle was shouting. "Fire over here, wiring
+ignited." Two men came running. Tance watched helplessly, his eyeglasses
+broken and bent.
+
+"So there is life here, after all," he said, half to himself. "But how
+could--"
+
+"Give us a hand," Fomar said, hurrying past. "Give us a hand, we've got
+to land the ship!"
+
+It was night. A few stars glinted above them, winking through the
+drifting silt that blew across the surface of the planet.
+
+Dorle peered out, frowning. "What a place to be stuck in." He resumed
+his work, hammering the bent metal hull of the ship back into place. He
+was wearing a pressure suit; there were still many small leaks, and
+radioactive particles from the atmosphere had already found their way
+into the ship.
+
+Nasha and Fomar were sitting at the table in the control room, pale and
+solemn, studying the inventory lists.
+
+"Low on carbohydrates," Fomar said. "We can break down the stored fats
+if we want to, but--"
+
+"I wonder if we could find anything outside." Nasha went to the window.
+"How uninviting it looks." She paced back and forth, very slender and
+small, her face dark with fatigue. "What do you suppose an exploring
+party would find?"
+
+Fomar shrugged. "Not much. Maybe a few weeds growing in cracks here and
+there. Nothing we could use. Anything that would adapt to this
+environment would be toxic, lethal."
+
+Nasha paused, rubbing her cheek. There was a deep scratch there, still
+red and swollen. "Then how do you explain--_it_? According to your
+theory the inhabitants must have died in their skins, fried like yams.
+But who fired on us? Somebody detected us, made a decision, aimed a
+gun."
+
+"And gauged distance," the Captain said feebly from the cot in the
+corner. He turned toward them. "That's the part that worries me. The
+first shell put us out of commission, the second almost destroyed us.
+They were well aimed, perfectly aimed. We're not such an easy target."
+
+"True." Fomar nodded. "Well, perhaps we'll know the answer before we
+leave here. What a strange situation! All our reasoning tells us that no
+life could exist; the whole planet burned dry, the atmosphere itself
+gone, completely poisoned."
+
+"The gun that fired the projectiles survived," Nasha said. "Why not
+people?"
+
+"It's not the same. Metal doesn't need air to breathe. Metal doesn't get
+leukemia from radioactive particles. Metal doesn't need food and water."
+
+There was silence.
+
+"A paradox," Nasha said. "Anyhow, in the morning I think we should send
+out a search party. And meanwhile we should keep on trying to get the
+ship in condition for the trip back."
+
+"It'll be days before we can take off," Fomar said. "We should keep
+every man working here. We can't afford to send out a party."
+
+Nasha smiled a little. "We'll send you in the first party. Maybe you can
+discover--what was it you were so interested in?"
+
+"Legumes. Edible legumes."
+
+"Maybe you can find some of them. Only--"
+
+"Only what?"
+
+"Only watch out. They fired on us once without even knowing who we were
+or what we came for. Do you suppose that they fought with each other?
+Perhaps they couldn't imagine anyone being friendly, under any
+circumstances. What a strange evolutionary trait, inter-species warfare.
+Fighting within the race!"
+
+"We'll know in the morning," Fomar said. "Let's get some sleep."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sun came up chill and austere. The three people, two men and a
+woman, stepped through the port, dropping down on the hard ground below.
+
+"What a day," Dorle said grumpily. "I said how glad I'd be to walk on
+firm ground again, but--"
+
+"Come on," Nasha said. "Up beside me. I want to say something to you.
+Will you excuse us, Tance?"
+
+Tance nodded gloomily. Dorle caught up with Nasha. They walked together,
+their metal shoes crunching the ground underfoot. Nasha glanced at him.
+
+"Listen. The Captain is dying. No one knows except the two of us. By the
+end of the day-period of this planet he'll be dead. The shock did
+something to his heart. He was almost sixty, you know."
+
+Dorle nodded. "That's bad. I have a great deal of respect for him. You
+will be captain in his place, of course. Since you're vice-captain
+now--"
+
+"No. I prefer to see someone else lead, perhaps you or Fomar. I've been
+thinking over the situation and it seems to me that I should declare
+myself mated to one of you, whichever of you wants to be captain. Then I
+could devolve the responsibility."
+
+"Well, I don't want to be captain. Let Fomar do it."
+
+Nasha studied him, tall and blond, striding along beside her in his
+pressure suit. "I'm rather partial to you," she said. "We might try it
+for a time, at least. But do as you like. Look, we're coming to
+something."
+
+They stopped walking, letting Tance catch up. In front of them was some
+sort of a ruined building. Dorle stared around thoughtfully.
+
+"Do you see? This whole place is a natural bowl, a huge valley. See how
+the rock formations rise up on all sides, protecting the floor. Maybe
+some of the great blast was deflected here."
+
+They wandered around the ruins, picking up rocks and fragments. "I think
+this was a farm," Tance said, examining a piece of wood. "This was part
+of a tower windmill."
+
+"Really?" Nasha took the stick and turned it over. "Interesting. But
+let's go; we don't have much time."
+
+"Look," Dorle said suddenly. "Off there, a long way off. Isn't that
+something?" He pointed.
+
+Nasha sucked in her breath. "The white stones."
+
+"What?"
+
+Nasha looked up at Dorle. "The white stones, the great broken teeth. We
+saw them, the Captain and I, from the control room." She touched Dorle's
+arm gently. "That's where they fired from. I didn't think we had landed
+so close."
+
+"What is it?" Tance said, coming up to them. "I'm almost blind without
+my glasses. What do you see?"
+
+"The city. Where they fired from."
+
+"Oh." All three of them stood together. "Well, let's go," Tance said.
+"There's no telling what we'll find there." Dorle frowned at him.
+
+"Wait. We don't know what we would be getting into. They must have
+patrols. They probably have seen us already, for that matter."
+
+"They probably have seen the ship itself," Tance said. "They probably
+know right now where they can find it, where they can blow it up. So
+what difference does it make whether we go closer or not?"
+
+"That's true," Nasha said. "If they really want to get us we haven't a
+chance. We have no armaments at all; you know that."
+
+"I have a hand weapon." Dorle nodded. "Well, let's go on, then. I
+suppose you're right, Tance."
+
+"But let's stay together," Tance said nervously. "Nasha, you're going
+too fast."
+
+Nasha looked back. She laughed. "If we expect to get there by nightfall
+we must go fast."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They reached the outskirts of the city at about the middle of the
+afternoon. The sun, cold and yellow, hung above them in the colorless
+sky. Dorle stopped at the top of a ridge overlooking the city.
+
+"Well, there it is. What's left of it."
+
+There was not much left. The huge concrete piers which they had noticed
+were not piers at all, but the ruined foundations of buildings. They had
+been baked by the searing heat, baked and charred almost to the ground.
+Nothing else remained, only this irregular circle of white squares,
+perhaps four miles in diameter.
+
+Dorle spat in disgust. "More wasted time. A dead skeleton of a city,
+that's all."
+
+"But it was from here that the firing came," Tance murmured. "Don't
+forget that."
+
+"And by someone with a good eye and a great deal of experience," Nasha
+added. "Let's go."
+
+They walked into the city between the ruined buildings. No one spoke.
+They walked in silence, listening to the echo of their footsteps.
+
+"It's macabre," Dorle muttered. "I've seen ruined cities before but they
+died of old age, old age and fatigue. This was killed, seared to death.
+This city didn't die--it was murdered."
+
+"I wonder what the city was called," Nasha said. She turned aside, going
+up the remains of a stairway from one of the foundations. "Do you think
+we might find a signpost? Some kind of plaque?"
+
+She peered into the ruins.
+
+"There's nothing there," Dorle said impatiently. "Come on."
+
+"Wait." Nasha bent down, touching a concrete stone. "There's something
+inscribed on this."
+
+"What is it?" Tance hurried up. He squatted in the dust, running his
+gloved fingers over the surface of the stone. "Letters, all right." He
+took a writing stick from the pocket of his pressure suit and copied the
+inscription on a bit of paper. Dorle glanced over his shoulder. The
+inscription was:
+
+    FRANKLIN APARTMENTS
+
+"That's this city," Nasha said softly. "That was its name."
+
+Tance put the paper in his pocket and they went on. After a time Dorle
+said, "Nasha, you know, I think we're being watched. But don't look
+around."
+
+The woman stiffened. "Oh? Why do you say that? Did you see something?"
+
+"No. I can feel it, though. Don't you?"
+
+Nasha smiled a little. "I feel nothing, but perhaps I'm more used to
+being stared at." She turned her head slightly. "Oh!"
+
+Dorle reached for his hand weapon. "What is it? What do you see?" Tance
+had stopped dead in his tracks, his mouth half open.
+
+"The gun," Nasha said. "It's the gun."
+
+"Look at the size of it. The size of the thing." Dorle unfastened his
+hand weapon slowly. "That's it, all right."
+
+The gun was huge. Stark and immense it pointed up at the sky, a mass of
+steel and glass, set in a huge slab of concrete. Even as they watched
+the gun moved on its swivel base, whirring underneath. A slim vane
+turned with the wind, a network of rods atop a high pole.
+
+"It's alive," Nasha whispered. "It's listening to us, watching us."
+
+The gun moved again, this time clockwise. It was mounted so that it
+could make a full circle. The barrel lowered a trifle, then resumed its
+original position.
+
+"But who fires it?" Tance said.
+
+Dorle laughed. "No one. No one fires it."
+
+They stared at him. "What do you mean?"
+
+"It fires itself."
+
+They couldn't believe him. Nasha came close to him, frowning, looking up
+at him. "I don't understand. What do you mean, it fires itself?"
+
+"Watch, I'll show you. Don't move." Dorle picked up a rock from the
+ground. He hesitated a moment and then tossed the rock high in the air.
+The rock passed in front of the gun. Instantly the great barrel moved,
+the vanes contracted.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The rock fell to the ground. The gun paused, then resumed its calm
+swivel, its slow circling.
+
+"You see," Dorle said, "it noticed the rock, as soon as I threw it up in
+the air. It's alert to anything that flies or moves above the ground
+level. Probably it detected us as soon as we entered the gravitational
+field of the planet. It probably had a bead on us from the start. We
+don't have a chance. It knows all about the ship. It's just waiting for
+us to take off again."
+
+"I understand about the rock," Nasha said, nodding. "The gun noticed it,
+but not us, since we're on the ground, not above. It's only designed to
+combat objects in the sky. The ship is safe until it takes off again,
+then the end will come."
+
+"But what's this gun for?" Tance put in. "There's no one alive here.
+Everyone is dead."
+
+"It's a machine," Dorle said. "A machine that was made to do a job. And
+it's doing the job. How it survived the blast I don't know. On it goes,
+waiting for the enemy. Probably they came by air in some sort of
+projectiles."
+
+"The enemy," Nasha said. "Their own race. It is hard to believe that
+they really bombed themselves, fired at themselves."
+
+"Well, it's over with. Except right here, where we're standing. This one
+gun, still alert, ready to kill. It'll go on until it wears out."
+
+"And by that time we'll be dead," Nasha said bitterly.
+
+"There must have been hundreds of guns like this," Dorle murmured. "They
+must have been used to the sight, guns, weapons, uniforms. Probably they
+accepted it as a natural thing, part of their lives, like eating and
+sleeping. An institution, like the church and the state. Men trained to
+fight, to lead armies, a regular profession. Honored, respected."
+
+Tance was walking slowly toward the gun, peering nearsightedly up at it.
+"Quite complex, isn't it? All those vanes and tubes. I suppose this is
+some sort of a telescopic sight." His gloved hand touched the end of a
+long tube.
+
+Instantly the gun shifted, the barrel retracting. It swung--
+
+"Don't move!" Dorle cried. The barrel swung past them as they stood,
+rigid and still. For one terrible moment it hesitated over their heads,
+clicking and whirring, settling into position. Then the sounds died out
+and the gun became silent.
+
+Tance smiled foolishly inside his helmet. "I must have put my finger
+over the lens. I'll be more careful." He made his way up onto the
+circular slab, stepping gingerly behind the body of the gun. He
+disappeared from view.
+
+"Where did he go?" Nasha said irritably. "He'll get us all killed."
+
+"Tance, come back!" Dorle shouted. "What's the matter with you?"
+
+"In a minute." There was a long silence. At last the archeologist
+appeared. "I think I've found something. Come up and I'll show you."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Dorle, you said the gun was here to keep the enemy off. I think I know
+why they wanted to keep the enemy off."
+
+They were puzzled.
+
+"I think I've found what the gun is supposed to guard. Come and give me
+a hand."
+
+"All right," Dorle said abruptly. "Let's go." He seized Nasha's hand.
+"Come on. Let's see what he's found. I thought something like this might
+happen when I saw that the gun was--"
+
+"Like what?" Nasha pulled her hand away. "What are you talking about?
+You act as if you knew what he's found."
+
+"I do." Dorle smiled down at her. "Do you remember the legend that all
+races have, the myth of the buried treasure, and the dragon, the serpent
+that watches it, guards it, keeping everyone away?"
+
+She nodded. "Well?"
+
+Dorle pointed up at the gun.
+
+"That," he said, "is the dragon. Come on."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Between the three of them they managed to pull up the steel cover and
+lay it to one side. Dorle was wet with perspiration when they finished.
+
+"It isn't worth it," he grunted. He stared into the dark yawning hole.
+"Or is it?"
+
+Nasha clicked on her hand lamp, shining the beam down the stairs. The
+steps were thick with dust and rubble. At the bottom was a steel door.
+
+"Come on," Tance said excitedly. He started down the stairs. They
+watched him reach the door and pull hopefully on it without success.
+"Give a hand!"
+
+"All right." They came gingerly after him. Dorle examined the door. It
+was bolted shut, locked. There was an inscription on the door but he
+could not read it.
+
+"Now what?" Nasha said.
+
+Dorle took out his hand weapon. "Stand back. I can't think of any other
+way." He pressed the switch. The bottom of the door glowed red.
+Presently it began to crumble. Dorle clicked the weapon off. "I think we
+can get through. Let's try."
+
+The door came apart easily. In a few minutes they had carried it away in
+pieces and stacked the pieces on the first step. Then they went on,
+flashing the light ahead of them.
+
+They were in a vault. Dust lay everywhere, on everything, inches thick.
+Wood crates lined the walls, huge boxes and crates, packages and
+containers. Tance looked around curiously, his eyes bright.
+
+"What exactly are all these?" he murmured. "Something valuable, I would
+think." He picked up a round drum and opened it. A spool fell to the
+floor, unwinding a black ribbon. He examined it, holding it up to the
+light.
+
+"Look at this!"
+
+They came around him. "Pictures," Nasha said. "Tiny pictures."
+
+"Records of some kind." Tance closed the spool up in the drum again.
+"Look, hundreds of drums." He flashed the light around. "And those
+crates. Let's open one."
+
+Dorle was already prying at the wood. The wood had turned brittle and
+dry. He managed to pull a section away.
+
+It was a picture. A boy in a blue garment, smiling pleasantly, staring
+ahead, young and handsome. He seemed almost alive, ready to move toward
+them in the light of the hand lamp. It was one of them, one of the
+ruined race, the race that had perished.
+
+For a long time they stared at the picture. At last Dorle replaced the
+board.
+
+"All these other crates," Nasha said. "More pictures. And these drums.
+What are in the boxes?"
+
+"This is their treasure," Tance said, almost to himself. "Here are their
+pictures, their records. Probably all their literature is here, their
+stories, their myths, their ideas about the universe."
+
+"And their history," Nasha said. "We'll be able to trace their
+development and find out what it was that made them become what they
+were."
+
+Dorle was wandering around the vault. "Odd," he murmured. "Even at the
+end, even after they had begun to fight they still knew, someplace down
+inside them, that their real treasure was this, their books and
+pictures, their myths. Even after their big cities and buildings and
+industries were destroyed they probably hoped to come back and find
+this. After everything else was gone."
+
+"When we get back home we can agitate for a mission to come here," Tance
+said. "All this can be loaded up and taken back. We'll be leaving
+about--"
+
+He stopped.
+
+"Yes," Dorle said dryly. "We'll be leaving about three day-periods from
+now. We'll fix the ship, then take off. Soon we'll be home, that is, if
+nothing happens. Like being shot down by that--"
+
+"Oh, stop it!" Nasha said impatiently. "Leave him alone. He's right: all
+this must be taken back home, sooner or later. We'll have to solve the
+problem of the gun. We have no choice."
+
+Dorle nodded. "What's your solution, then? As soon as we leave the
+ground we'll be shot down." His face twisted bitterly. "They've guarded
+their treasure too well. Instead of being preserved it will lie here
+until it rots. It serves them right."
+
+"How?"
+
+"Don't you see? This was the only way they knew, building a gun and
+setting it up to shoot anything that came along. They were so certain
+that everything was hostile, the enemy, coming to take their possessions
+away from them. Well, they can keep them."
+
+Nasha was deep in thought, her mind far away. Suddenly she gasped.
+"Dorle," she said. "What's the matter with us? We have no problem. The
+gun is no menace at all."
+
+The two men stared at her.
+
+"No menace?" Dorle said. "It's already shot us down once. And as soon as
+we take off again--"
+
+"Don't you see?" Nasha began to laugh. "The poor foolish gun, it's
+completely harmless. Even I could deal with it alone."
+
+"You?"
+
+Her eyes were flashing. "With a crowbar. With a hammer or a stick of
+wood. Let's go back to the ship and load up. Of course we're at its
+mercy in the air: that's the way it was made. It can fire into the sky,
+shoot down anything that flies. But that's all! Against something on the
+ground it has no defenses. Isn't that right?"
+
+Dorle nodded slowly. "The soft underbelly of the dragon. In the legend,
+the dragon's armor doesn't cover its stomach." He began to laugh.
+"That's right. That's perfectly right."
+
+"Let's go, then," Nasha said. "Let's get back to the ship. We have work
+to do here."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was early the next morning when they reached the ship. During the
+night the Captain had died, and the crew had ignited his body, according
+to custom. They had stood solemnly around it until the last ember died.
+As they were going back to their work the woman and the two men
+appeared, dirty and tired, still excited.
+
+And presently, from the ship, a line of people came, each carrying
+something in his hands. The line marched across the gray slag, the
+eternal expanse of fused metal. When they reached the weapon they all
+fell on the gun at once, with crowbars, hammers, anything that was heavy
+and hard.
+
+The telescopic sights shattered into bits. The wiring was pulled out,
+torn to shreds. The delicate gears were smashed, dented.
+
+Finally the warheads themselves were carried off and the firing pins
+removed.
+
+The gun was smashed, the great weapon destroyed. The people went down
+into the vault and examined the treasure. With its metal-armored
+guardian dead there was no danger any longer. They studied the pictures,
+the films, the crates of books, the jeweled crowns, the cups, the
+statues.
+
+At last, as the sun was dipping into the gray mists that drifted across
+the planet they came back up the stairs again. For a moment they stood
+around the wrecked gun looking at the unmoving outline of it.
+
+Then they started back to the ship. There was still much work to be
+done. The ship had been badly hurt, much had been damaged and lost. The
+important thing was to repair it as quickly as possible, to get it into
+the air.
+
+With all of them working together it took just five more days to make it
+spaceworthy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Nasha stood in the control room, watching the planet fall away behind
+them. She folded her arms, sitting down on the edge of the table.
+
+"What are you thinking?" Dorle said.
+
+"I? Nothing."
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"I was thinking that there must have been a time when this planet was
+quite different, when there was life on it."
+
+"I suppose there was. It's unfortunate that no ships from our system
+came this far, but then we had no reason to suspect intelligent life
+until we saw the fission glow in the sky."
+
+"And then it was too late."
+
+"Not quite too late. After all, their possessions, their music, books,
+their pictures, all of that will survive. We'll take them home and study
+them, and they'll change us. We won't be the same afterwards. Their
+sculpturing, especially. Did you see the one of the great winged
+creature, without a head or arms? Broken off, I suppose. But those
+wings-- It looked very old. It will change us a great deal."
+
+"When we come back we won't find the gun waiting for us," Nasha said.
+"Next time it won't be there to shoot us down. We can land and take the
+treasure, as you call it." She smiled up at Dorle. "You'll lead us back
+there, as a good captain should."
+
+"Captain?" Dorle grinned. "Then you've decided."
+
+Nasha shrugged. "Fomar argues with me too much. I think, all in all, I
+really prefer you."
+
+"Then let's go," Dorle said. "Let's go back home."
+
+The ship roared up, flying over the ruins of the city. It turned in a
+huge arc and then shot off beyond the horizon, heading into outer space.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Down below, in the center of the ruined city, a single half-broken
+detector vane moved slightly, catching the roar of the ship. The base of
+the great gun throbbed painfully, straining to turn. After a moment a
+red warning light flashed on down inside its destroyed works.
+
+And a long way off, a hundred miles from the city, another warning light
+flashed on, far underground. Automatic relays flew into action. Gears
+turned, belts whined. On the ground above a section of metal slag
+slipped back. A ramp appeared.
+
+A moment later a small cart rushed to the surface.
+
+The cart turned toward the city. A second cart appeared behind it. It
+was loaded with wiring cables. Behind it a third cart came, loaded with
+telescopic tube sights. And behind came more carts, some with relays,
+some with firing controls, some with tools and parts, screws and bolts,
+pins and nuts. The final one contained atomic warheads.
+
+The carts lined up behind the first one, the lead cart. The lead cart
+started off, across the frozen ground, bumping calmly along, followed by
+the others. Moving toward the city.
+
+To the damaged gun.
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/data/pg31516.txt

+It was quite by accident I discovered this incredible invasion of
+Earth by lifeforms from another planet. As yet, I haven't done
+anything about it; I can't think of anything to do. I wrote to the
+Government, and they sent back a pamphlet on the repair and
+maintenance of frame houses. Anyhow, the whole thing is known; I'm not
+the first to discover it. Maybe it's even under control.
+
+I was sitting in my easy-chair, idly turning the pages of a
+paperbacked book someone had left on the bus, when I came across the
+reference that first put me on the trail. For a moment I didn't
+respond. It took some time for the full import to sink in. After I'd
+comprehended, it seemed odd I hadn't noticed it right away.
+
+The reference was clearly to a nonhuman species of incredible
+properties, not indigenous to Earth. A species, I hasten to point out,
+customarily masquerading as ordinary human beings. Their disguise,
+however, became transparent in the face of the following observations
+by the author. It was at once obvious the author knew everything. Knew
+everything--and was taking it in his stride. The line (and I tremble
+remembering it even now) read:
+
+    _... his eyes slowly roved about the room._
+
+Vague chills assailed me. I tried to picture the eyes. Did they roll
+like dimes? The passage indicated not; they seemed to move through the
+air, not over the surface. Rather rapidly, apparently. No one in the
+story was surprised. That's what tipped me off. No sign of amazement
+at such an outrageous thing. Later the matter was amplified.
+
+    _... his eyes moved from person to person._
+
+There it was in a nutshell. The eyes had clearly come apart from the
+rest of him and were on their own. My heart pounded and my breath
+choked in my windpipe. I had stumbled on an accidental mention of a
+totally unfamiliar race. Obviously non-Terrestrial. Yet, to the
+characters in the book, it was perfectly natural--which suggested they
+belonged to the same species.
+
+And the author? A slow suspicion burned in my mind. The author was
+taking it rather _too easily_ in his stride. Evidently, he felt this
+was quite a usual thing. He made absolutely no attempt to conceal this
+knowledge. The story continued:
+
+    _... presently his eyes fastened on Julia._
+
+Julia, being a lady, had at least the breeding to feel indignant. She
+is described as blushing and knitting her brows angrily. At this, I
+sighed with relief. They weren't _all_ non-Terrestrials. The narrative
+continues:
+
+    _... slowly, calmly, his eyes examined every inch of her._
+
+Great Scott! But here the girl turned and stomped off and the matter
+ended. I lay back in my chair gasping with horror. My wife and family
+regarded me in wonder.
+
+"What's wrong, dear?" my wife asked.
+
+I couldn't tell her. Knowledge like this was too much for the ordinary
+run-of-the-mill person. I had to keep it to myself. "Nothing," I
+gasped. I leaped up, snatched the book, and hurried out of the room.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the garage, I continued reading. There was more. Trembling, I read
+the next revealing passage:
+
+    _... he put his arm around Julia. Presently she asked him if
+    he would remove his arm. He immediately did so, with a smile._
+
+It's not said what was done with the arm after the fellow had removed
+it. Maybe it was left standing upright in the corner. Maybe it was
+thrown away. I don't care. In any case, the full meaning was there,
+staring me right in the face.
+
+Here was a race of creatures capable of removing portions of their
+anatomy at will. Eyes, arms--and maybe more. Without batting an
+eyelash. My knowledge of biology came in handy, at this point.
+Obviously they were simple beings, uni-cellular, some sort of
+primitive single-celled things. Beings no more developed than
+starfish. Starfish can do the same thing, you know.
+
+I read on. And came to this incredible revelation, tossed off coolly
+by the author without the faintest tremor:
+
+    _... outside the movie theater we split up. Part of us went
+    inside, part over to the cafe for dinner._
+
+Binary fission, obviously. Splitting in half and forming two entities.
+Probably each lower half went to the cafe, it being farther, and the
+upper halves to the movies. I read on, hands shaking. I had really
+stumbled onto something here. My mind reeled as I made out this
+passage:
+
+    _... I'm afraid there's no doubt about it. Poor Bibney has
+    lost his head again._
+
+Which was followed by:
+
+    _... and Bob says he has utterly no guts._
+
+Yet Bibney got around as well as the next person. The next person,
+however, was just as strange. He was soon described as:
+
+    _... totally lacking in brains._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There was no doubt of the thing in the next passage. Julia, whom I had
+thought to be the one normal person, reveals herself as also being an
+alien life form, similar to the rest:
+
+    _... quite deliberately, Julia had given her heart to the
+    young man._
+
+It didn't relate what the final disposition of the organ was, but I
+didn't really care. It was evident Julia had gone right on living in
+her usual manner, like all the others in the book. Without heart,
+arms, eyes, brains, viscera, dividing up in two when the occasion
+demanded. Without a qualm.
+
+    _... thereupon she gave him her hand._
+
+I sickened. The rascal now had her hand, as well as her heart. I
+shudder to think what he's done with them, by this time.
+
+    _... he took her arm._
+
+Not content to wait, he had to start dismantling her on his own.
+Flushing crimson, I slammed the book shut and leaped to my feet. But
+not in time to escape one last reference to those carefree bits of
+anatomy whose travels had originally thrown me on the track:
+
+    _... her eyes followed him all the way down the road and
+    across the meadow._
+
+I rushed from the garage and back inside the warm house, as if the
+accursed things were following me. My wife and children were playing
+Monopoly in the kitchen. I joined them and played with frantic fervor,
+brow feverish, teeth chattering.
+
+I had had enough of the thing. I want to hear no more about it. Let
+them come on. Let them invade Earth. I don't want to get mixed up in
+it.
+
+I have absolutely no stomach for it.
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/data/pg32032.txt

+    The claws were bad enough in the first place--nasty, crawling
+    little death-robots. But when they began to imitate their
+    creators, it was time for the human race to make peace--if it
+    could!
+
+
+The Russian soldier made his way nervously up the ragged side of the
+hill, holding his gun ready. He glanced around him, licking his dry
+lips, his face set. From time to time he reached up a gloved hand and
+wiped perspiration from his neck, pushing down his coat collar.
+
+Eric turned to Corporal Leone. "Want him? Or can I have him?" He
+adjusted the view sight so the Russian's features squarely filled the
+glass, the lines cutting across his hard, somber features.
+
+Leone considered. The Russian was close, moving rapidly, almost
+running. "Don't fire. Wait." Leone tensed. "I don't think we're
+needed."
+
+The Russian increased his pace, kicking ash and piles of debris out of
+his way. He reached the top of the hill and stopped, panting, staring
+around him. The sky was overcast, drifting clouds of gray particles.
+Bare trunks of trees jutted up occasionally; the ground was level and
+bare, rubble-strewn, with the ruins of buildings standing out here and
+there like yellowing skulls.
+
+The Russian was uneasy. He knew something was wrong. He started down
+the hill. Now he was only a few paces from the bunker. Eric was
+getting fidgety. He played with his pistol, glancing at Leone.
+
+"Don't worry," Leone said. "He won't get here. They'll take care of
+him."
+
+"Are you sure? He's got damn far."
+
+"They hang around close to the bunker. He's getting into the bad part.
+Get set!"
+
+The Russian began to hurry, sliding down the hill, his boots sinking
+into the heaps of gray ash, trying to keep his gun up. He stopped for
+a moment, lifting his fieldglasses to his face.
+
+"He's looking right at us," Eric said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Russian came on. They could see his eyes, like two blue stones.
+His mouth was open a little. He needed a shave; his chin was stubbled.
+On one bony cheek was a square of tape, showing blue at the edge. A
+fungoid spot. His coat was muddy and torn. One glove was missing. As
+he ran his belt counter bounced up and down against him.
+
+Leone touched Eric's arm. "Here one comes."
+
+Across the ground something small and metallic came, flashing in the
+dull sunlight of mid-day. A metal sphere. It raced up the hill after
+the Russian, its treads flying. It was small, one of the baby ones.
+Its claws were out, two razor projections spinning in a blur of white
+steel. The Russian heard it. He turned instantly, firing. The sphere
+dissolved into particles. But already a second had emerged and was
+following the first. The Russian fired again.
+
+A third sphere leaped up the Russian's leg, clicking and whirring. It
+jumped to the shoulder. The spinning blades disappeared into the
+Russian's throat.
+
+Eric relaxed. "Well, that's that. God, those damn things give me the
+creeps. Sometimes I think we were better off before."
+
+"If we hadn't invented them, they would have." Leone lit a cigarette
+shakily. "I wonder why a Russian would come all this way alone. I
+didn't see anyone covering him."
+
+Lt. Scott came slipping up the tunnel, into the bunker. "What
+happened? Something entered the screen."
+
+"An Ivan."
+
+"Just one?"
+
+Eric brought the view screen around. Scott peered into it. Now there
+were numerous metal spheres crawling over the prostrate body, dull
+metal globes clicking and whirring, sawing up the Russian into small
+parts to be carried away.
+
+"What a lot of claws," Scott murmured.
+
+"They come like flies. Not much game for them any more."
+
+Scott pushed the sight away, disgusted. "Like flies. I wonder why he
+was out there. They know we have claws all around."
+
+A larger robot had joined the smaller spheres. It was directing
+operations, a long blunt tube with projecting eyepieces. There was not
+much left of the soldier. What remained was being brought down the
+hillside by the host of claws.
+
+"Sir," Leone said. "If it's all right, I'd like to go out there and
+take a look at him."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Maybe he came with something."
+
+Scott considered. He shrugged. "All right. But be careful."
+
+"I have my tab." Leone patted the metal band at his wrist. "I'll be
+out of bounds."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He picked up his rifle and stepped carefully up to the mouth of the
+bunker, making his way between blocks of concrete and steel prongs,
+twisted and bent. The air was cold at the top. He crossed over the
+ground toward the remains of the soldier, striding across the soft
+ash. A wind blew around him, swirling gray particles up in his face.
+He squinted and pushed on.
+
+The claws retreated as he came close, some of them stiffening into
+immobility. He touched his tab. The Ivan would have given something
+for that! Short hard radiation emitted from the tab neutralized the
+claws, put them out of commission. Even the big robot with its two
+waving eyestalks retreated respectfully as he approached.
+
+He bent down over the remains of the soldier. The gloved hand was
+closed tightly. There was something in it. Leone pried the fingers
+apart. A sealed container, aluminum. Still shiny.
+
+He put it in his pocket and made his way back to the bunker. Behind
+him the claws came back to life, moving into operation again. The
+procession resumed, metal spheres moving through the gray ash with
+their loads. He could hear their treads scrabbling against the ground.
+He shuddered.
+
+Scott watched intently as he brought the shiny tube out of his pocket.
+"He had that?"
+
+"In his hand." Leone unscrewed the top. "Maybe you should look at it,
+sir."
+
+Scott took it. He emptied the contents out in the palm of his hand. A
+small piece of silk paper, carefully folded. He sat down by the light
+and unfolded it.
+
+"What's it say, sir?" Eric said. Several officers came up the tunnel.
+Major Hendricks appeared.
+
+"Major," Scott said. "Look at this."
+
+Hendricks read the slip. "This just come?"
+
+"A single runner. Just now."
+
+"Where is he?" Hendricks asked sharply.
+
+"The claws got him."
+
+Major Hendricks grunted. "Here." He passed it to his companions. "I
+think this is what we've been waiting for. They certainly took their
+time about it."
+
+"So they want to talk terms," Scott said. "Are we going along with
+them?"
+
+"That's not for us to decide." Hendricks sat down. "Where's the
+communications officer? I want the Moon Base."
+
+Leone pondered as the communications officer raised the outside
+antenna cautiously, scanning the sky above the bunker for any sign of
+a watching Russian ship.
+
+"Sir," Scott said to Hendricks. "It's sure strange they suddenly came
+around. We've been using the claws for almost a year. Now all of a
+sudden they start to fold."
+
+"Maybe claws have been getting down in their bunkers."
+
+"One of the big ones, the kind with stalks, got into an Ivan bunker
+last week," Eric said. "It got a whole platoon of them before they got
+their lid shut."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"A buddy told me. The thing came back with--with remains."
+
+"Moon Base, sir," the communications officer said.
+
+On the screen the face of the lunar monitor appeared. His crisp
+uniform contrasted to the uniforms in the bunker. And he was clean
+shaven. "Moon Base."
+
+"This is forward command L-Whistle. On Terra. Let me have General
+Thompson."
+
+The monitor faded. Presently General Thompson's heavy features came
+into focus. "What is it, Major?"
+
+"Our claws got a single Russian runner with a message. We don't know
+whether to act on it--there have been tricks like this in the past."
+
+"What's the message?"
+
+"The Russians want us to send a single officer on policy level over to
+their lines. For a conference. They don't state the nature of the
+conference. They say that matters of--" He consulted the slip.
+"--Matters of grave urgency make it advisable that discussion be
+opened between a representative of the UN forces and themselves."
+
+He held the message up to the screen for the general to scan.
+Thompson's eyes moved.
+
+"What should we do?" Hendricks said.
+
+"Send a man out."
+
+"You don't think it's a trap?"
+
+"It might be. But the location they give for their forward command is
+correct. It's worth a try, at any rate."
+
+"I'll send an officer out. And report the results to you as soon as he
+returns."
+
+"All right, Major." Thompson broke the connection. The screen died. Up
+above, the antenna came slowly down.
+
+Hendricks rolled up the paper, deep in thought.
+
+"I'll go," Leone said.
+
+"They want somebody at policy level." Hendricks rubbed his jaw.
+"Policy level. I haven't been outside in months. Maybe I could use a
+little air."
+
+"Don't you think it's risky?"
+
+Hendricks lifted the view sight and gazed into it. The remains of the
+Russian were gone. Only a single claw was in sight. It was folding
+itself back, disappearing into the ash, like a crab. Like some hideous
+metal crab....
+
+"That's the only thing that bothers me." Hendricks rubbed his wrist.
+"I know I'm safe as long as I have this on me. But there's something
+about them. I hate the damn things. I wish we'd never invented them.
+There's something wrong with them. Relentless little--"
+
+"If we hadn't invented them, the Ivans would have."
+
+Hendricks pushed the sight back. "Anyhow, it seems to be winning the
+war. I guess that's good."
+
+"Sounds like you're getting the same jitters as the Ivans." Hendricks
+examined his wrist watch. "I guess I had better get started, if I want
+to be there before dark."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He took a deep breath and then stepped out onto the gray, rubbled
+ground. After a minute he lit a cigarette and stood gazing around him.
+The landscape was dead. Nothing stirred. He could see for miles,
+endless ash and slag, ruins of buildings. A few trees without leaves
+or branches, only the trunks. Above him the eternal rolling clouds of
+gray, drifting between Terra and the sun.
+
+Major Hendricks went on. Off to the right something scuttled,
+something round and metallic. A claw, going lickety-split after
+something. Probably after a small animal, a rat. They got rats, too.
+As a sort of sideline.
+
+He came to the top of the little hill and lifted his fieldglasses. The
+Russian lines were a few miles ahead of him. They had a forward
+command post there. The runner had come from it.
+
+A squat robot with undulating arms passed by him, its arms weaving
+inquiringly. The robot went on its way, disappearing under some
+debris. Hendricks watched it go. He had never seen that type before.
+There were getting to be more and more types he had never seen, new
+varieties and sizes coming up from the underground factories.
+
+Hendricks put out his cigarette and hurried on. It was interesting,
+the use of artificial forms in warfare. How had they got started?
+Necessity. The Soviet Union had gained great initial success, usual
+with the side that got the war going. Most of North America had been
+blasted off the map. Retaliation was quick in coming, of course. The
+sky was full of circling disc-bombers long before the war began; they
+had been up there for years. The discs began sailing down all over
+Russia within hours after Washington got it.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But that hadn't helped Washington.
+
+The American bloc governments moved to the Moon Base the first year.
+There was not much else to do. Europe was gone; a slag heap with dark
+weeds growing from the ashes and bones. Most of North America was
+useless; nothing could be planted, no one could live. A few million
+people kept going up in Canada and down in South America. But during
+the second year Soviet parachutists began to drop, a few at first,
+then more and more. They wore the first really effective
+anti-radiation equipment; what was left of American production moved
+to the moon along with the governments.
+
+All but the troops. The remaining troops stayed behind as best they
+could, a few thousand here, a platoon there. No one knew exactly where
+they were; they stayed where they could, moving around at night,
+hiding in ruins, in sewers, cellars, with the rats and snakes. It
+looked as if the Soviet Union had the war almost won. Except for a
+handful of projectiles fired off from the moon daily, there was almost
+no weapon in use against them. They came and went as they pleased. The
+war, for all practical purposes, was over. Nothing effective opposed
+them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And then the first claws appeared. And overnight the complexion of the
+war changed.
+
+The claws were awkward, at first. Slow. The Ivans knocked them off
+almost as fast as they crawled out of their underground tunnels. But
+then they got better, faster and more cunning. Factories, all on
+Terra, turned them out. Factories a long way under ground, behind the
+Soviet lines, factories that had once made atomic projectiles, now
+almost forgotten.
+
+The claws got faster, and they got bigger. New types appeared, some
+with feelers, some that flew. There were a few jumping kinds.
+
+The best technicians on the moon were working on designs, making them
+more and more intricate, more flexible. They became uncanny; the Ivans
+were having a lot of trouble with them. Some of the little claws were
+learning to hide themselves, burrowing down into the ash, lying in
+wait.
+
+And then they started getting into the Russian bunkers, slipping down
+when the lids were raised for air and a look around. One claw inside a
+bunker, a churning sphere of blades and metal--that was enough. And
+when one got in others followed. With a weapon like that the war
+couldn't go on much longer.
+
+Maybe it was already over.
+
+Maybe he was going to hear the news. Maybe the Politburo had decided
+to throw in the sponge. Too bad it had taken so long. Six years. A
+long time for war like that, the way they had waged it. The automatic
+retaliation discs, spinning down all over Russia, hundreds of
+thousands of them. Bacteria crystals. The Soviet guided missiles,
+whistling through the air. The chain bombs. And now this, the robots,
+the claws--
+
+The claws weren't like other weapons. They were _alive_, from any
+practical standpoint, whether the Governments wanted to admit it or
+not. They were not machines. They were living things, spinning,
+creeping, shaking themselves up suddenly from the gray ash and darting
+toward a man, climbing up him, rushing for his throat. And that was
+what they had been designed to do. Their job.
+
+They did their job well. Especially lately, with the new designs
+coming up. Now they repaired themselves. They were on their own.
+Radiation tabs protected the UN troops, but if a man lost his tab he
+was fair game for the claws, no matter what his uniform. Down below
+the surface automatic machinery stamped them out. Human beings stayed
+a long way off. It was too risky; nobody wanted to be around them.
+They were left to themselves. And they seemed to be doing all right.
+The new designs were faster, more complex. More efficient.
+
+Apparently they had won the war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Major Hendricks lit a second cigarette. The landscape depressed him.
+Nothing but ash and ruins. He seemed to be alone, the only living
+thing in the whole world. To the right the ruins of a town rose up, a
+few walls and heaps of debris. He tossed the dead match away,
+increasing his pace. Suddenly he stopped, jerking up his gun, his body
+tense. For a minute it looked like--
+
+From behind the shell of a ruined building a figure came, walking
+slowly toward him, walking hesitantly.
+
+Hendricks blinked. "Stop!"
+
+The boy stopped. Hendricks lowered his gun. The boy stood silently,
+looking at him. He was small, not very old. Perhaps eight. But it was
+hard to tell. Most of the kids who remained were stunted. He wore a
+faded blue sweater, ragged with dirt, and short pants. His hair was
+long and matted. Brown hair. It hung over his face and around his
+ears. He held something in his arms.
+
+"What's that you have?" Hendricks said sharply.
+
+The boy held it out. It was a toy, a bear. A teddy bear. The boy's
+eyes were large, but without expression.
+
+Hendricks relaxed. "I don't want it. Keep it."
+
+The boy hugged the bear again.
+
+"Where do you live?" Hendricks said.
+
+"In there."
+
+"The ruins?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Underground?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How many are there?"
+
+"How--how many?"
+
+"How many of you. How big's your settlement?"
+
+The boy did not answer.
+
+Hendricks frowned. "You're not all by yourself, are you?"
+
+The boy nodded.
+
+"How do you stay alive?"
+
+"There's food."
+
+"What kind of food?"
+
+"Different."
+
+Hendricks studied him. "How old are you?"
+
+"Thirteen."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It wasn't possible. Or was it? The boy was thin, stunted. And probably
+sterile. Radiation exposure, years straight. No wonder he was so
+small. His arms and legs were like pipecleaners, knobby, and thin.
+Hendricks touched the boy's arm. His skin was dry and rough; radiation
+skin. He bent down, looking into the boy's face. There was no
+expression. Big eyes, big and dark.
+
+"Are you blind?" Hendricks said.
+
+"No. I can see some."
+
+"How do you get away from the claws?"
+
+"The claws?"
+
+"The round things. That run and burrow."
+
+"I don't understand."
+
+Maybe there weren't any claws around. A lot of areas were free. They
+collected mostly around bunkers, where there were people. The claws
+had been designed to sense warmth, warmth of living things.
+
+"You're lucky." Hendricks straightened up. "Well? Which way are you
+going? Back--back there?"
+
+"Can I come with you?"
+
+"With _me_?" Hendricks folded his arms. "I'm going a long way. Miles.
+I have to hurry." He looked at his watch. "I have to get there by
+nightfall."
+
+"I want to come."
+
+Hendricks fumbled in his pack. "It isn't worth it. Here." He tossed
+down the food cans he had with him. "You take these and go back.
+Okay?"
+
+The boy said nothing.
+
+"I'll be coming back this way. In a day or so. If you're around here
+when I come back you can come along with me. All right?"
+
+"I want to go with you now."
+
+"It's a long walk."
+
+"I can walk."
+
+Hendricks shifted uneasily. It made too good a target, two people
+walking along. And the boy would slow him down. But he might not come
+back this way. And if the boy were really all alone--
+
+"Okay. Come along."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The boy fell in beside him. Hendricks strode along. The boy walked
+silently, clutching his teddy bear.
+
+"What's your name?" Hendricks said, after a time.
+
+"David Edward Derring."
+
+"David? What--what happened to your mother and father?"
+
+"They died."
+
+"How?"
+
+"In the blast."
+
+"How long ago?"
+
+"Six years."
+
+Hendricks slowed down. "You've been alone six years?"
+
+"No. There were other people for awhile. They went away."
+
+"And you've been alone since?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Hendricks glanced down. The boy was strange, saying very little.
+Withdrawn. But that was the way they were, the children who had
+survived. Quiet. Stoic. A strange kind of fatalism gripped them.
+Nothing came as a surprise. They accepted anything that came along.
+There was no longer any _normal_, any natural course of things, moral
+or physical, for them to expect. Custom, habit, all the determining
+forces of learning were gone; only brute experience remained.
+
+"Am I walking too fast?" Hendricks said.
+
+"No."
+
+"How did you happen to see me?"
+
+"I was waiting."
+
+"Waiting?" Hendricks was puzzled. "What were you waiting for?"
+
+"To catch things."
+
+"What kind of things?"
+
+"Things to eat."
+
+"Oh." Hendricks set his lips grimly. A thirteen year old boy, living
+on rats and gophers and half-rotten canned food. Down in a hole under
+the ruins of a town. With radiation pools and claws, and Russian
+dive-mines up above, coasting around in the sky.
+
+"Where are we going?" David asked.
+
+"To the Russian lines."
+
+"Russian?"
+
+"The enemy. The people who started the war. They dropped the first
+radiation bombs. They began all this."
+
+The boy nodded. His face showed no expression.
+
+"I'm an American," Hendricks said.
+
+There was no comment. On they went, the two of them, Hendricks walking
+a little ahead, David trailing behind him, hugging his dirty teddy
+bear against his chest.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+About four in the afternoon they stopped to eat. Hendricks built a
+fire in a hollow between some slabs of concrete. He cleared the weeds
+away and heaped up bits of wood. The Russians' lines were not very far
+ahead. Around him was what had once been a long valley, acres of fruit
+trees and grapes. Nothing remained now but a few bleak stumps and the
+mountains that stretched across the horizon at the far end. And the
+clouds of rolling ash that blew and drifted with the wind, settling
+over the weeds and remains of buildings, walls here and there, once in
+awhile what had been a road.
+
+Hendricks made coffee and heated up some boiled mutton and bread.
+"Here." He handed bread and mutton to David. David squatted by the
+edge of the fire, his knees knobby and white. He examined the food and
+then passed it back, shaking his head.
+
+"No."
+
+"No? Don't you want any?"
+
+"No."
+
+Hendricks shrugged. Maybe the boy was a mutant, used to special food.
+It didn't matter. When he was hungry he would find something to eat.
+The boy was strange. But there were many strange changes coming over
+the world. Life was not the same, anymore. It would never be the same
+again. The human race was going to have to realize that.
+
+"Suit yourself," Hendricks said. He ate the bread and mutton by
+himself, washing it down with coffee. He ate slowly, finding the food
+hard to digest. When he was done he got to his feet and stamped the
+fire out.
+
+David rose slowly, watching him with his young-old eyes.
+
+"We're going," Hendricks said.
+
+"All right."
+
+Hendricks walked along, his gun in his arms. They were close; he was
+tense, ready for anything. The Russians should be expecting a runner,
+an answer to their own runner, but they were tricky. There was always
+the possibility of a slipup. He scanned the landscape around him.
+Nothing but slag and ash, a few hills, charred trees. Concrete walls.
+But someplace ahead was the first bunker of the Russian lines, the
+forward command. Underground, buried deep, with only a periscope
+showing, a few gun muzzles. Maybe an antenna.
+
+"Will we be there soon?" David asked.
+
+"Yes. Getting tired?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Why, then?"
+
+David did not answer. He plodded carefully along behind, picking his
+way over the ash. His legs and shoes were gray with dust. His pinched
+face was streaked, lines of gray ash in riverlets down the pale white
+of his skin. There was no color to his face. Typical of the new
+children, growing up in cellars and sewers and underground shelters.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks slowed down. He lifted his fieldglasses and studied the
+ground ahead of him. Were they there, someplace, waiting for him?
+Watching him, the way his men had watched the Russian runner? A chill
+went up his back. Maybe they were getting their guns ready, preparing
+to fire, the way his men had prepared, made ready to kill.
+
+Hendricks stopped, wiping perspiration from his face. "Damn." It made
+him uneasy. But he should be expected. The situation was different.
+
+He strode over the ash, holding his gun tightly with both hands.
+Behind him came David. Hendricks peered around, tight-lipped. Any
+second it might happen. A burst of white light, a blast, carefully
+aimed from inside a deep concrete bunker.
+
+He raised his arm and waved it around in a circle.
+
+Nothing moved. To the right a long ridge ran, topped with dead tree
+trunks. A few wild vines had grown up around the trees, remains of
+arbors. And the eternal dark weeds. Hendricks studied the ridge. Was
+anything up there? Perfect place for a lookout. He approached the
+ridge warily, David coming silently behind. If it were his command
+he'd have a sentry up there, watching for troops trying to infiltrate
+into the command area. Of course, if it were his command there would
+be the claws around the area for full protection.
+
+He stopped, feet apart, hands on his hips.
+
+"Are we there?" David said.
+
+"Almost."
+
+"Why have we stopped?"
+
+"I don't want to take any chances." Hendricks advanced slowly. Now the
+ridge lay directly beside him, along his right. Overlooking him. His
+uneasy feeling increased. If an Ivan were up there he wouldn't have a
+chance. He waved his arm again. They should be expecting someone in
+the UN uniform, in response to the note capsule. Unless the whole
+thing was a trap.
+
+"Keep up with me." He turned toward David. "Don't drop behind."
+
+"With you?"
+
+"Up beside me! We're close. We can't take any chances. Come on."
+
+"I'll be all right." David remained behind him, in the rear, a few
+paces away, still clutching his teddy bear.
+
+"Have it your way." Hendricks raised his glasses again, suddenly
+tense. For a moment--had something moved? He scanned the ridge
+carefully. Everything was silent. Dead. No life up there, only tree
+trunks and ash. Maybe a few rats. The big black rats that had survived
+the claws. Mutants--built their own shelters out of saliva and ash.
+Some kind of plaster. Adaptation. He started forward again.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A tall figure came out on the ridge above him, cloak flapping.
+Gray-green. A Russian. Behind him a second soldier appeared, another
+Russian. Both lifted their guns, aiming.
+
+Hendricks froze. He opened his mouth. The soldiers were kneeling,
+sighting down the side of the slope. A third figure had joined them on
+the ridge top, a smaller figure in gray-green. A woman. She stood
+behind the other two.
+
+Hendricks found his voice. "Stop!" He waved up at them frantically.
+"I'm--"
+
+The two Russians fired. Behind Hendricks there was a faint _pop_.
+Waves of heat lapped against him, throwing him to the ground. Ash tore
+at his face, grinding into his eyes and nose. Choking, he pulled
+himself to his knees. It was all a trap. He was finished. He had come
+to be killed, like a steer. The soldiers and the woman were coming
+down the side of the ridge toward him, sliding down through the soft
+ash. Hendricks was numb. His head throbbed. Awkwardly, he got his
+rifle up and took aim. It weighed a thousand tons; he could hardly
+hold it. His nose and cheeks stung. The air was full of the blast
+smell, a bitter acrid stench.
+
+"Don't fire," the first Russian said, in heavily accented English.
+
+The three of them came up to him, surrounding him. "Put down your
+rifle, Yank," the other said.
+
+Hendricks was dazed. Everything had happened so fast. He had been
+caught. And they had blasted the boy. He turned his head. David was
+gone. What remained of him was strewn across the ground.
+
+The three Russians studied him curiously. Hendricks sat, wiping blood
+from his nose, picking out bits of ash. He shook his head, trying to
+clear it. "Why did you do it?" he murmured thickly. "The boy."
+
+"Why?" One of the soldiers helped him roughly to his feet. He turned
+Hendricks around. "Look."
+
+Hendricks closed his eyes.
+
+"Look!" The two Russians pulled him forward. "See. Hurry up. There
+isn't much time to spare, Yank!"
+
+Hendricks looked. And gasped.
+
+"See now? Now do you understand?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From the remains of David a metal wheel rolled. Relays, glinting
+metal. Parts, wiring. One of the Russians kicked at the heap of
+remains. Parts popped out, rolling away, wheels and springs and rods.
+A plastic section fell in, half charred. Hendricks bent shakily down.
+The front of the head had come off. He could make out the intricate
+brain, wires and relays, tiny tubes and switches, thousands of minute
+studs--
+
+"A robot," the soldier holding his arm said. "We watched it tagging
+you."
+
+"Tagging me?"
+
+"That's their way. They tag along with you. Into the bunker. That's
+how they get in."
+
+Hendricks blinked, dazed. "But--"
+
+"Come on." They led him toward the ridge. "We can't stay here. It
+isn't safe. There must be hundreds of them all around here."
+
+The three of them pulled him up the side of the ridge, sliding and
+slipping on the ash. The woman reached the top and stood waiting for
+them.
+
+"The forward command," Hendricks muttered. "I came to negotiate with
+the Soviet--"
+
+"There is no more forward command. _They_ got in. We'll explain." They
+reached the top of the ridge. "We're all that's left. The three of us.
+The rest were down in the bunker."
+
+"This way. Down this way." The woman unscrewed a lid, a gray manhole
+cover set in the ground. "Get in."
+
+Hendricks lowered himself. The two soldiers and the woman came behind
+him, following him down the ladder. The woman closed the lid after
+them, bolting it tightly into place.
+
+"Good thing we saw you," one of the two soldiers grunted. "It had
+tagged you about as far as it was going to."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Give me one of your cigarettes," the woman said. "I haven't had an
+American cigarette for weeks."
+
+Hendricks pushed the pack to her. She took a cigarette and passed the
+pack to the two soldiers. In the corner of the small room the lamp
+gleamed fitfully. The room was low-ceilinged, cramped. The four of
+them sat around a small wood table. A few dirty dishes were stacked to
+one side. Behind a ragged curtain a second room was partly visible.
+Hendricks saw the corner of a cot, some blankets, clothes hung on a
+hook.
+
+"We were here," the soldier beside him said. He took off his helmet,
+pushing his blond hair back. "I'm Corporal Rudi Maxer. Polish.
+Impressed in the Soviet Army two years ago." He held out his hand.
+
+Hendricks hesitated and then shook. "Major Joseph Hendricks."
+
+"Klaus Epstein." The other soldier shook with him, a small dark man
+with thinning hair. Epstein plucked nervously at his ear. "Austrian.
+Impressed God knows when. I don't remember. The three of us were here,
+Rudi and I, with Tasso." He indicated the woman. "That's how we
+escaped. All the rest were down in the bunker."
+
+"And--and _they_ got in?"
+
+Epstein lit a cigarette. "First just one of them. The kind that tagged
+you. Then it let others in."
+
+Hendricks became alert. "The _kind_? Are there more than one kind?"
+
+"The little boy. David. David holding his teddy bear. That's Variety
+Three. The most effective."
+
+"What are the other types?"
+
+Epstein reached into his coat. "Here." He tossed a packet of
+photographs onto the table, tied with a string. "Look for yourself."
+
+Hendricks untied the string.
+
+"You see," Rudi Maxer said, "that was why we wanted to talk terms. The
+Russians, I mean. We found out about a week ago. Found out that your
+claws were beginning to make up new designs on their own. New types of
+their own. Better types. Down in your underground factories behind our
+lines. You let them stamp themselves, repair themselves. Made them
+more and more intricate. It's your fault this happened."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks examined the photos. They had been snapped hurriedly; they
+were blurred and indistinct. The first few showed--David. David
+walking along a road, by himself. David and another David. Three
+Davids. All exactly alike. Each with a ragged teddy bear.
+
+All pathetic.
+
+"Look at the others," Tasso said.
+
+The next pictures, taken at a great distance, showed a towering
+wounded soldier sitting by the side of a path, his arm in a sling, the
+stump of one leg extended, a crude crutch on his lap. Then two wounded
+soldiers, both the same, standing side by side.
+
+"That's Variety One. The Wounded Soldier." Klaus reached out and took
+the pictures. "You see, the claws were designed to get to human
+beings. To find them. Each kind was better than the last. They got
+farther, closer, past most of our defenses, into our lines. But as
+long as they were merely _machines_, metal spheres with claws and
+horns, feelers, they could be picked off like any other object. They
+could be detected as lethal robots as soon as they were seen. Once we
+caught sight of them--"
+
+"Variety One subverted our whole north wing," Rudi said. "It was a
+long time before anyone caught on. Then it was too late. They came in,
+wounded soldiers, knocking and begging to be let in. So we let them
+in. And as soon as they were in they took over. We were watching out
+for machines...."
+
+"At that time it was thought there was only the one type," Klaus
+Epstein said. "No one suspected there were other types. The pictures
+were flashed to us. When the runner was sent to you, we knew of just
+one type. Variety One. The big Wounded Soldier. We thought that was
+all."
+
+"Your line fell to--"
+
+"To Variety Three. David and his bear. That worked even better." Klaus
+smiled bitterly. "Soldiers are suckers for children. We brought them
+in and tried to feed them. We found out the hard way what they were
+after. At least, those who were in the bunker."
+
+"The three of us were lucky," Rudi said. "Klaus and I were--were
+visiting Tasso when it happened. This is her place." He waved a big
+hand around. "This little cellar. We finished and climbed the ladder
+to start back. From the ridge we saw. There they were, all around the
+bunker. Fighting was still going on. David and his bear. Hundreds of
+them. Klaus took the pictures."
+
+Klaus tied up the photographs again.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"And it's going on all along your line?" Hendricks said.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How about _our_ lines?" Without thinking, he touched the tab on his
+arm. "Can they--"
+
+"They're not bothered by your radiation tabs. It makes no difference
+to them, Russian, American, Pole, German. It's all the same. They're
+doing what they were designed to do. Carrying out the original idea.
+They track down life, wherever they find it."
+
+"They go by warmth," Klaus said. "That was the way you constructed
+them from the very start. Of course, those you designed were kept back
+by the radiation tabs you wear. Now they've got around that. These new
+varieties are lead-lined."
+
+"What's the other variety?" Hendricks asked. "The David type, the
+Wounded Soldier--what's the other?"
+
+"We don't know." Klaus pointed up at the wall. On the wall were two
+metal plates, ragged at the edges. Hendricks got up and studied them.
+They were bent and dented.
+
+"The one on the left came off a Wounded Soldier," Rudi said. "We got
+one of them. It was going along toward our old bunker. We got it from
+the ridge, the same way we got the David tagging you."
+
+The plate was stamped: I-V. Hendricks touched the other plate. "And
+this came from the David type?"
+
+"Yes." The plate was stamped: III-V.
+
+Klaus took a look at them, leaning over Hendricks' broad shoulder.
+"You can see what we're up against. There's another type. Maybe it was
+abandoned. Maybe it didn't work. But there must be a Second Variety.
+There's One and Three."
+
+"You were lucky," Rudi said. "The David tagged you all the way here
+and never touched you. Probably thought you'd get it into a bunker,
+somewhere."
+
+"One gets in and it's all over," Klaus said. "They move fast. One lets
+all the rest inside. They're inflexible. Machines with one purpose.
+They were built for only one thing." He rubbed sweat from his lip. "We
+saw."
+
+They were silent.
+
+"Let me have another cigarette, Yank," Tasso said. "They are good. I
+almost forgot how they were."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was night. The sky was black. No stars were visible through the
+rolling clouds of ash. Klaus lifted the lid cautiously so that
+Hendricks could look out.
+
+Rudi pointed into the darkness. "Over that way are the bunkers. Where
+we used to be. Not over half a mile from us. It was just chance Klaus
+and I were not there when it happened. Weakness. Saved by our lusts."
+
+"All the rest must be dead," Klaus said in a low voice. "It came
+quickly. This morning the Politburo reached their decision. They
+notified us--forward command. Our runner was sent out at once. We saw
+him start toward the direction of your lines. We covered him until he
+was out of sight."
+
+"Alex Radrivsky. We both knew him. He disappeared about six o'clock.
+The sun had just come up. About noon Klaus and I had an hour relief.
+We crept off, away from the bunkers. No one was watching. We came
+here. There used to be a town here, a few houses, a street. This
+cellar was part of a big farmhouse. We knew Tasso would be here,
+hiding down in her little place. We had come here before. Others from
+the bunkers came here. Today happened to be our turn."
+
+"So we were saved," Klaus said. "Chance. It might have been others.
+We--we finished, and then we came up to the surface and started back
+along the ridge. That was when we saw them, the Davids. We understood
+right away. We had seen the photos of the First Variety, the Wounded
+Soldier. Our Commissar distributed them to us with an explanation. If
+we had gone another step they would have seen us. As it was we had to
+blast two Davids before we got back. There were hundreds of them, all
+around. Like ants. We took pictures and slipped back here, bolting the
+lid tight."
+
+"They're not so much when you catch them alone. We moved faster than
+they did. But they're inexorable. Not like living things. They came
+right at us. And we blasted them."
+
+Major Hendricks rested against the edge of the lid, adjusting his eyes
+to the darkness. "Is it safe to have the lid up at all?"
+
+"If we're careful. How else can you operate your transmitter?"
+
+Hendricks lifted the small belt transmitter slowly. He pressed it
+against his ear. The metal was cold and damp. He blew against the
+mike, raising up the short antenna. A faint hum sounded in his ear.
+"That's true, I suppose."
+
+But he still hesitated.
+
+"We'll pull you under if anything happens," Klaus said.
+
+"Thanks." Hendricks waited a moment, resting the transmitter against
+his shoulder. "Interesting, isn't it?"
+
+"What?"
+
+"This, the new types. The new varieties of claws. We're completely at
+their mercy, aren't we? By now they've probably gotten into the UN
+lines, too. It makes me wonder if we're not seeing the beginning of a
+new species. _The_ new species. Evolution. The race to come after
+man."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Rudi grunted. "There is no race after man."
+
+"No? Why not? Maybe we're seeing it now, the end of human beings, the
+beginning of the new society."
+
+"They're not a race. They're mechanical killers. You made them to
+destroy. That's all they can do. They're machines with a job."
+
+"So it seems now. But how about later on? After the war is over.
+Maybe, when there aren't any humans to destroy, their real
+potentialities will begin to show."
+
+"You talk as if they were alive!"
+
+"Aren't they?"
+
+There was silence. "They're machines," Rudi said. "They look like
+people, but they're machines."
+
+"Use your transmitter, Major," Klaus said. "We can't stay up here
+forever."
+
+Holding the transmitter tightly Hendricks called the code of the
+command bunker. He waited, listening. No response. Only silence. He
+checked the leads carefully. Everything was in place.
+
+"Scott!" he said into the mike. "Can you hear me?"
+
+Silence. He raised the gain up full and tried again. Only static.
+
+"I don't get anything. They may hear me but they may not want to
+answer."
+
+"Tell them it's an emergency."
+
+"They'll think I'm being forced to call. Under your direction." He
+tried again, outlining briefly what he had learned. But still the
+phone was silent, except for the faint static.
+
+"Radiation pools kill most transmission," Klaus said, after awhile.
+"Maybe that's it."
+
+Hendricks shut the transmitter up. "No use. No answer. Radiation
+pools? Maybe. Or they hear me, but won't answer. Frankly, that's what
+I would do, if a runner tried to call from the Soviet lines. They have
+no reason to believe such a story. They may hear everything I say--"
+
+"Or maybe it's too late."
+
+Hendricks nodded.
+
+"We better get the lid down," Rudi said nervously. "We don't want to
+take unnecessary chances."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They climbed slowly back down the tunnel. Klaus bolted the lid
+carefully into place. They descended into the kitchen. The air was
+heavy and close around them.
+
+"Could they work that fast?" Hendricks said. "I left the bunker this
+noon. Ten hours ago. How could they move so quickly?"
+
+"It doesn't take them long. Not after the first one gets in. It goes
+wild. You know what the little claws can do. Even _one_ of these is
+beyond belief. Razors, each finger. Maniacal."
+
+"All right." Hendricks moved away impatiently. He stood with his back
+to them.
+
+"What's the matter?" Rudi said.
+
+"The Moon Base. God, if they've gotten there--"
+
+"The Moon Base?"
+
+Hendricks turned around. "They couldn't have got to the Moon Base. How
+would they get there? It isn't possible. I can't believe it."
+
+"What is this Moon Base? We've heard rumors, but nothing definite.
+What is the actual situation? You seem concerned."
+
+"We're supplied from the moon. The governments are there, under the
+lunar surface. All our people and industries. That's what keeps us
+going. If they should find some way of getting off Terra, onto the
+moon--"
+
+"It only takes one of them. Once the first one gets in it admits the
+others. Hundreds of them, all alike. You should have seen them.
+Identical. Like ants."
+
+"Perfect socialism," Tasso said. "The ideal of the communist state.
+All citizens interchangeable."
+
+Klaus grunted angrily. "That's enough. Well? What next?"
+
+Hendricks paced back and forth, around the small room. The air was
+full of smells of food and perspiration. The others watched him.
+Presently Tasso pushed through the curtain, into the other room. "I'm
+going to take a nap."
+
+The curtain closed behind her. Rudi and Klaus sat down at the table,
+still watching Hendricks.
+
+"It's up to you," Klaus said. "We don't know your situation."
+
+Hendricks nodded.
+
+"It's a problem." Rudi drank some coffee, filling his cup from a rusty
+pot. "We're safe here for awhile, but we can't stay here forever. Not
+enough food or supplies."
+
+"But if we go outside--"
+
+"If we go outside they'll get us. Or probably they'll get us. We
+couldn't go very far. How far is your command bunker, Major?"
+
+"Three or four miles."
+
+"We might make it. The four of us. Four of us could watch all sides.
+They couldn't slip up behind us and start tagging us. We have three
+rifles, three blast rifles. Tasso can have my pistol." Rudi tapped his
+belt. "In the Soviet army we didn't have shoes always, but we had
+guns. With all four of us armed one of us might get to your command
+bunker. Preferably you, Major."
+
+"What if they're already there?" Klaus said.
+
+Rudi shrugged. "Well, then we come back here."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks stopped pacing. "What do you think the chances are they're
+already in the American lines?"
+
+"Hard to say. Fairly good. They're organized. They know exactly what
+they're doing. Once they start they go like a horde of locusts. They
+have to keep moving, and fast. It's secrecy and speed they depend on.
+Surprise. They push their way in before anyone has any idea."
+
+"I see," Hendricks murmured.
+
+From the other room Tasso stirred. "Major?"
+
+Hendricks pushed the curtain back. "What?"
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Tasso looked up at him lazily from the cot. "Have you any more
+American cigarettes left?"
+
+Hendricks went into the room and sat down across from her, on a wood
+stool. He felt in his pockets. "No. All gone."
+
+"Too bad."
+
+"What nationality are you?" Hendricks asked after awhile.
+
+"Russian."
+
+"How did you get here?"
+
+"Here?"
+
+"This used to be France. This was part of Normandy. Did you come with
+the Soviet army?"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Just curious." He studied her. She had taken off her coat, tossing it
+over the end of the cot. She was young, about twenty. Slim. Her long
+hair stretched out over the pillow. She was staring at him silently,
+her eyes dark and large.
+
+"What's on your mind?" Tasso said.
+
+"Nothing. How old are you?"
+
+"Eighteen." She continued to watch him, unblinking, her arms behind
+her head. She had on Russian army pants and shirt. Gray-green. Thick
+leather belt with counter and cartridges. Medicine kit.
+
+"You're in the Soviet army?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Where did you get the uniform?"
+
+She shrugged. "It was given to me," she told him.
+
+"How--how old were you when you came here?"
+
+"Sixteen."
+
+"That young?"
+
+Her eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks rubbed his jaw. "Your life would have been a lot different
+if there had been no war. Sixteen. You came here at sixteen. To live
+this way."
+
+"I had to survive."
+
+"I'm not moralizing."
+
+"Your life would have been different, too," Tasso murmured. She
+reached down and unfastened one of her boots. She kicked the boot off,
+onto the floor. "Major, do you want to go in the other room? I'm
+sleepy."
+
+"It's going to be a problem, the four of us here. It's going to be
+hard to live in these quarters. Are there just the two rooms?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How big was the cellar originally? Was it larger than this? Are there
+other rooms filled up with debris? We might be able to open one of
+them."
+
+"Perhaps. I really don't know." Tasso loosened her belt. She made
+herself comfortable on the cot, unbuttoning her shirt. "You're sure
+you have no more cigarettes?"
+
+"I had only the one pack."
+
+"Too bad. Maybe if we get back to your bunker we can find some." The
+other boot fell. Tasso reached up for the light cord. "Good night."
+
+"You're going to sleep?"
+
+"That's right."
+
+The room plunged into darkness. Hendricks got up and made his way past
+the curtain, into the kitchen.
+
+And stopped, rigid.
+
+Rudi stood against the wall, his face white and gleaming. His mouth
+opened and closed but no sounds came. Klaus stood in front of him, the
+muzzle of his pistol in Rudi's stomach. Neither of them moved. Klaus,
+his hand tight around his gun, his features set. Rudi, pale and
+silent, spread-eagled against the wall.
+
+"What--" Hendricks muttered, but Klaus cut him off.
+
+"Be quiet, Major. Come over here. Your gun. Get out your gun."
+
+Hendricks drew his pistol. "What is it?"
+
+"Cover him." Klaus motioned him forward. "Beside me. Hurry!"
+
+Rudi moved a little, lowering his arms. He turned to Hendricks,
+licking his lips. The whites of his eyes shone wildly. Sweat dripped
+from his forehead, down his cheeks. He fixed his gaze on Hendricks.
+"Major, he's gone insane. Stop him." Rudi's voice was thin and hoarse,
+almost inaudible.
+
+"What's going on?" Hendricks demanded.
+
+Without lowering his pistol Klaus answered. "Major, remember our
+discussion? The Three Varieties? We knew about One and Three. But we
+didn't know about Two. At least, we didn't know before." Klaus'
+fingers tightened around the gun butt. "We didn't know before, but we
+know now."
+
+He pressed the trigger. A burst of white heat rolled out of the gun,
+licking around Rudi.
+
+"Major, this is the Second Variety."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tasso swept the curtain aside. "Klaus! What did you do?"
+
+Klaus turned from the charred form, gradually sinking down the wall
+onto the floor. "The Second Variety, Tasso. Now we know. We have all
+three types identified. The danger is less. I--"
+
+Tasso stared past him at the remains of Rudi, at the blackened,
+smouldering fragments and bits of cloth. "You killed him."
+
+"Him? _It_, you mean. I was watching. I had a feeling, but I wasn't
+sure. At least, I wasn't sure before. But this evening I was certain."
+Klaus rubbed his pistol butt nervously. "We're lucky. Don't you
+understand? Another hour and it might--"
+
+"You were _certain_?" Tasso pushed past him and bent down, over the
+steaming remains on the floor. Her face became hard. "Major, see for
+yourself. Bones. Flesh."
+
+Hendricks bent down beside her. The remains were human remains. Seared
+flesh, charred bone fragments, part of a skull. Ligaments, viscera,
+blood. Blood forming a pool against the wall.
+
+"No wheels," Tasso said calmly. She straightened up. "No wheels, no
+parts, no relays. Not a claw. Not the Second Variety." She folded her
+arms. "You're going to have to be able to explain this."
+
+Klaus sat down at the table, all the color drained suddenly from his
+face. He put his head in his hands and rocked back and forth.
+
+"Snap out of it." Tasso's fingers closed over his shoulder. "Why did
+you do it? Why did you kill him?"
+
+"He was frightened," Hendricks said. "All this, the whole thing,
+building up around us."
+
+"Maybe."
+
+"What, then? What do you think?"
+
+"I think he may have had a reason for killing Rudi. A good reason."
+
+"What reason?"
+
+"Maybe Rudi learned something."
+
+Hendricks studied her bleak face. "About what?" he asked.
+
+"About him. About Klaus."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Klaus looked up quickly. "You can see what she's trying to say. She
+thinks I'm the Second Variety. Don't you see, Major? Now she wants you
+to believe I killed him on purpose. That I'm--"
+
+"Why did you kill him, then?" Tasso said.
+
+"I told you." Klaus shook his head wearily. "I thought he was a claw.
+I thought I knew."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I had been watching him. I was suspicious."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I thought I had seen something. Heard something. I thought I--" He
+stopped.
+
+"Go on."
+
+"We were sitting at the table. Playing cards. You two were in the
+other room. It was silent. I thought I heard him--_whirr_."
+
+There was silence.
+
+"Do you believe that?" Tasso said to Hendricks.
+
+"Yes. I believe what he says."
+
+"I don't. I think he killed Rudi for a good purpose." Tasso touched
+the rifle, resting in the corner of the room. "Major--"
+
+"No." Hendricks shook his head. "Let's stop it right now. One is
+enough. We're afraid, the way he was. If we kill him we'll be doing
+what he did to Rudi."
+
+Klaus looked gratefully up at him. "Thanks. I was afraid. You
+understand, don't you? Now she's afraid, the way I was. She wants to
+kill me."
+
+"No more killing." Hendricks moved toward the end of the ladder. "I'm
+going above and try the transmitter once more. If I can't get them
+we're moving back toward my lines tomorrow morning."
+
+Klaus rose quickly. "I'll come up with you and give you a hand."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The night air was cold. The earth was cooling off. Klaus took a deep
+breath, filling his lungs. He and Hendricks stepped onto the ground,
+out of the tunnel. Klaus planted his feet wide apart, the rifle up,
+watching and listening. Hendricks crouched by the tunnel mouth, tuning
+the small transmitter.
+
+"Any luck?" Klaus asked presently.
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Keep trying. Tell them what happened."
+
+Hendricks kept trying. Without success. Finally he lowered the
+antenna. "It's useless. They can't hear me. Or they hear me and won't
+answer. Or--"
+
+"Or they don't exist."
+
+"I'll try once more." Hendricks raised the antenna. "Scott, can you
+hear me? Come in!"
+
+He listened. There was only static. Then, still very faintly--
+
+"This is Scott."
+
+His fingers tightened. "Scott! Is it you?"
+
+"This is Scott."
+
+Klaus squatted down. "Is it your command?"
+
+"Scott, listen. Do you understand? About them, the claws. Did you get
+my message? Did you hear me?"
+
+"Yes." Faintly. Almost inaudible. He could hardly make out the word.
+
+"You got my message? Is everything all right at the bunker? None of
+them have got in?"
+
+"Everything is all right."
+
+"Have they tried to get in?"
+
+The voice was weaker.
+
+"No."
+
+Hendricks turned to Klaus. "They're all right."
+
+"Have they been attacked?"
+
+"No." Hendricks pressed the phone tighter to his ear. "Scott, I can
+hardly hear you. Have you notified the Moon Base? Do they know? Are
+they alerted?"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Scott! Can you hear me?"
+
+Silence.
+
+Hendricks relaxed, sagging. "Faded out. Must be radiation pools."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks and Klaus looked at each other. Neither of them said
+anything. After a time Klaus said, "Did it sound like any of your men?
+Could you identify the voice?"
+
+"It was too faint."
+
+"You couldn't be certain?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then it could have been--"
+
+"I don't know. Now I'm not sure. Let's go back down and get the lid
+closed."
+
+They climbed back down the ladder slowly, into the warm cellar. Klaus
+bolted the lid behind them. Tasso waited for them, her face
+expressionless.
+
+"Any luck?" she asked.
+
+Neither of them answered. "Well?" Klaus said at last. "What do you
+think, Major? Was it your officer, or was it one of _them_?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"Then we're just where we were before."
+
+Hendricks stared down at the floor, his jaw set. "We'll have to go. To
+be sure."
+
+"Anyhow, we have food here for only a few weeks. We'd have to go up
+after that, in any case."
+
+"Apparently so."
+
+"What's wrong?" Tasso demanded. "Did you get across to your bunker?
+What's the matter?"
+
+"It may have been one of my men," Hendricks said slowly. "Or it may
+have been one of _them_. But we'll never know standing here." He
+examined his watch. "Let's turn in and get some sleep. We want to be
+up early tomorrow."
+
+"Early?"
+
+"Our best chance to get through the claws should be early in the
+morning," Hendricks said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The morning was crisp and clear. Major Hendricks studied the
+countryside through his fieldglasses.
+
+"See anything?" Klaus said.
+
+"No."
+
+"Can you make out our bunkers?"
+
+"Which way?"
+
+"Here." Klaus took the glasses and adjusted them. "I know where to
+look." He looked a long time, silently.
+
+Tasso came to the top of the tunnel and stepped up onto the ground.
+"Anything?"
+
+"No." Klaus passed the glasses back to Hendricks. "They're out of
+sight. Come on. Let's not stay here."
+
+The three of them made their way down the side of the ridge, sliding
+in the soft ash. Across a flat rock a lizard scuttled. They stopped
+instantly, rigid.
+
+"What was it?" Klaus muttered.
+
+"A lizard."
+
+The lizard ran on, hurrying through the ash. It was exactly the same
+color as the ash.
+
+"Perfect adaptation," Klaus said. "Proves we were right. Lysenko, I
+mean."
+
+They reached the bottom of the ridge and stopped, standing close
+together, looking around them.
+
+"Let's go." Hendricks started off. "It's a good long trip, on foot."
+
+Klaus fell in beside him. Tasso walked behind, her pistol held
+alertly. "Major, I've been meaning to ask you something," Klaus said.
+"How did you run across the David? The one that was tagging you."
+
+"I met it along the way. In some ruins."
+
+"What did it say?"
+
+"Not much. It said it was alone. By itself."
+
+"You couldn't tell it was a machine? It talked like a living person?
+You never suspected?"
+
+"It didn't say much. I noticed nothing unusual.
+
+"It's strange, machines so much like people that you can be fooled.
+Almost alive. I wonder where it'll end."
+
+"They're doing what you Yanks designed them to do," Tasso said. "You
+designed them to hunt out life and destroy. Human life. Wherever they
+find it."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks was watching Klaus intently. "Why did you ask me? What's on
+your mind?"
+
+"Nothing," Klaus answered.
+
+"Klaus thinks you're the Second Variety," Tasso said calmly, from
+behind them. "Now he's got his eye on you."
+
+Klaus flushed. "Why not? We sent a runner to the Yank lines and he
+comes back. Maybe he thought he'd find some good game here."
+
+Hendricks laughed harshly. "I came from the UN bunkers. There were
+human beings all around me."
+
+"Maybe you saw an opportunity to get into the Soviet lines. Maybe you
+saw your chance. Maybe you--"
+
+"The Soviet lines had already been taken over. Your lines had been
+invaded before I left my command bunker. Don't forget that."
+
+Tasso came up beside him. "That proves nothing at all, Major."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"There appears to be little communication between the varieties. Each
+is made in a different factory. They don't seem to work together. You
+might have started for the Soviet lines without knowing anything about
+the work of the other varieties. Or even what the other varieties were
+like."
+
+"How do you know so much about the claws?" Hendricks said.
+
+"I've seen them. I've observed them. I observed them take over the
+Soviet bunkers."
+
+"You know quite a lot," Klaus said. "Actually, you saw very little.
+Strange that you should have been such an acute observer."
+
+Tasso laughed. "Do you suspect me, now?"
+
+"Forget it," Hendricks said. They walked on in silence.
+
+"Are we going the whole way on foot?" Tasso said, after awhile. "I'm
+not used to walking." She gazed around at the plain of ash, stretching
+out on all sides of them, as far as they could see. "How dreary."
+
+"It's like this all the way," Klaus said.
+
+"In a way I wish you had been in your bunker when the attack came."
+
+"Somebody else would have been with you, if not me," Klaus muttered.
+
+Tasso laughed, putting her hands in her pockets. "I suppose so."
+
+They walked on, keeping their eyes on the vast plain of silent ash
+around them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sun was setting. Hendricks made his way forward slowly, waving
+Tasso and Klaus back. Klaus squatted down, resting his gun butt
+against the ground.
+
+Tasso found a concrete slab and sat down with a sigh. "It's good to
+rest."
+
+"Be quiet," Klaus said sharply.
+
+Hendricks pushed up to the top of the rise ahead of them. The same
+rise the Russian runner had come up, the day before. Hendricks dropped
+down, stretching himself out, peering through his glasses at what lay
+beyond.
+
+Nothing was visible. Only ash and occasional trees. But there, not
+more than fifty yards ahead, was the entrance of the forward command
+bunker. The bunker from which he had come. Hendricks watched silently.
+No motion. No sign of life. Nothing stirred.
+
+Klaus slithered up beside him. "Where is it?"
+
+"Down there." Hendricks passed him the glasses. Clouds of ash rolled
+across the evening sky. The world was darkening. They had a couple of
+hours of light left, at the most. Probably not that much.
+
+"I don't see anything," Klaus said.
+
+"That tree there. The stump. By the pile of bricks. The entrance is to
+the right of the bricks."
+
+"I'll have to take your word for it."
+
+"You and Tasso cover me from here. You'll be able to sight all the way
+to the bunker entrance."
+
+"You're going down alone?"
+
+"With my wrist tab I'll be safe. The ground around the bunker is a
+living field of claws. They collect down in the ash. Like crabs.
+Without tabs you wouldn't have a chance."
+
+"Maybe you're right."
+
+"I'll walk slowly all the way. As soon as I know for certain--"
+
+"If they're down inside the bunker you won't be able to get back up
+here. They go fast. You don't realize."
+
+"What do you suggest?"
+
+Klaus considered. "I don't know. Get them to come up to the surface.
+So you can see."
+
+Hendricks brought his transmitter from his belt, raising the antenna.
+"Let's get started."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Klaus signalled to Tasso. She crawled expertly up the side of the rise
+to where they were sitting.
+
+"He's going down alone," Klaus said. "We'll cover him from here. As
+soon as you see him start back, fire past him at once. They come
+quick."
+
+"You're not very optimistic," Tasso said.
+
+"No, I'm not."
+
+Hendricks opened the breech of his gun, checking it carefully. "Maybe
+things are all right."
+
+"You didn't see them. Hundreds of them. All the same. Pouring out like
+ants."
+
+"I should be able to find out without going down all the way."
+Hendricks locked his gun, gripping it in one hand, the transmitter in
+the other. "Well, wish me luck."
+
+Klaus put out his hand. "Don't go down until you're sure. Talk to them
+from up here. Make them show themselves."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks stood up. He stepped down the side of the rise.
+
+A moment later he was walking slowly toward the pile of bricks and
+debris beside the dead tree stump. Toward the entrance of the forward
+command bunker.
+
+Nothing stirred. He raised the transmitter, clicking it on. "Scott?
+Can you hear me?"
+
+Silence.
+
+"Scott! This is Hendricks. Can you hear me? I'm standing outside the
+bunker. You should be able to see me in the view sight."
+
+He listened, the transmitter gripped tightly. No sound. Only static.
+He walked forward. A claw burrowed out of the ash and raced toward
+him. It halted a few feet away and then slunk off. A second claw
+appeared, one of the big ones with feelers. It moved toward him,
+studied him intently, and then fell in behind him, dogging
+respectfully after him, a few paces away. A moment later a second big
+claw joined it. Silently, the claws trailed him, as he walked slowly
+toward the bunker.
+
+Hendricks stopped, and behind him, the claws came to a halt. He was
+close, now. Almost to the bunker steps.
+
+"Scott! Can you hear me? I'm standing right above you. Outside. On the
+surface. Are you picking me up?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He waited, holding his gun against his side, the transmitter tightly
+to his ear. Time passed. He strained to hear, but there was only
+silence. Silence, and faint static.
+
+Then, distantly, metallically--
+
+"This is Scott."
+
+The voice was neutral. Cold. He could not identify it. But the
+earphone was minute.
+
+"Scott! Listen. I'm standing right above you. I'm on the surface,
+looking down into the bunker entrance."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Can you see me?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Through the view sight? You have the sight trained on me?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Hendricks pondered. A circle of claws waited quietly around him,
+gray-metal bodies on all sides of him. "Is everything all right in the
+bunker? Nothing unusual has happened?"
+
+"Everything is all right."
+
+"Will you come up to the surface? I want to see you for a moment."
+Hendricks took a deep breath. "Come up here with me. I want to talk to
+you."
+
+"Come down."
+
+"I'm giving you an order."
+
+Silence.
+
+"Are you coming?" Hendricks listened. There was no response. "I order
+you to come to the surface."
+
+"Come down."
+
+Hendricks set his jaw. "Let me talk to Leone."
+
+There was a long pause. He listened to the static. Then a voice came,
+hard, thin, metallic. The same as the other. "This is Leone."
+
+"Hendricks. I'm on the surface. At the bunker entrance. I want one of
+you to come up here."
+
+"Come down."
+
+"Why come down? I'm giving you an order!"
+
+Silence. Hendricks lowered the transmitter. He looked carefully around
+him. The entrance was just ahead. Almost at his feet. He lowered the
+antenna and fastened the transmitter to his belt. Carefully, he
+gripped his gun with both hands. He moved forward, a step at a time.
+If they could see him they knew he was starting toward the entrance.
+He closed his eyes a moment.
+
+Then he put his foot on the first step that led downward.
+
+Two Davids came up at him, their faces identical and expressionless.
+He blasted them into particles. More came rushing silently up, a whole
+pack of them. All exactly the same.
+
+Hendricks turned and raced back, away from the bunker, back toward the
+rise.
+
+At the top of the rise Tasso and Klaus were firing down. The small
+claws were already streaking up toward them, shining metal spheres
+going fast, racing frantically through the ash. But he had no time to
+think about that. He knelt down, aiming at the bunker entrance, gun
+against his cheek. The Davids were coming out in groups, clutching
+their teddy bears, their thin knobby legs pumping as they ran up the
+steps to the surface. Hendricks fired into the main body of them. They
+burst apart, wheels and springs flying in all directions. He fired
+again through the mist of particles.
+
+A giant lumbering figure rose up in the bunker entrance, tall and
+swaying. Hendricks paused, amazed. A man, a soldier. With one leg,
+supporting himself with a crutch.
+
+"Major!" Tasso's voice came. More firing. The huge figure moved
+forward, Davids swarming around it. Hendricks broke out of his freeze.
+The First Variety. The Wounded Soldier.
+
+He aimed and fired. The soldier burst into bits, parts and relays
+flying. Now many Davids were out on the flat ground, away from the
+bunker. He fired again and again, moving slowly back, half-crouching
+and aiming.
+
+From the rise, Klaus fired down. The side of the rise was alive with
+claws making their way up. Hendricks retreated toward the rise,
+running and crouching. Tasso had left Klaus and was circling slowly to
+the right, moving away from the rise.
+
+A David slipped up toward him, its small white face expressionless,
+brown hair hanging down in its eyes. It bent over suddenly, opening
+its arms. Its teddy bear hurtled down and leaped across the ground,
+bounding toward him. Hendricks fired. The bear and the David both
+dissolved. He grinned, blinking. It was like a dream.
+
+"Up here!" Tasso's voice. Hendricks made his way toward her. She was
+over by some columns of concrete, walls of a ruined building. She was
+firing past him, with the hand pistol Klaus had given her.
+
+"Thanks." He joined her, grasping for breath. She pulled him back,
+behind the concrete, fumbling at her belt.
+
+"Close your eyes!" She unfastened a globe from her waist. Rapidly, she
+unscrewed the cap, locking it into place. "Close your eyes and get
+down."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+She threw the bomb. It sailed in an arc, an expert, rolling and
+bouncing to the entrance of the bunker. Two Wounded Soldiers stood
+uncertainly by the brick pile. More Davids poured from behind them,
+out onto the plain. One of the Wounded Soldiers moved toward the bomb,
+stooping awkwardly down to pick it up.
+
+The bomb went off. The concussion whirled Hendricks around, throwing
+him on his face. A hot wind rolled over him. Dimly he saw Tasso
+standing behind the columns, firing slowly and methodically at the
+Davids coming out of the raging clouds of white fire.
+
+Back along the rise Klaus struggled with a ring of claws circling
+around him. He retreated, blasting at them and moving back, trying to
+break through the ring.
+
+Hendricks struggled to his feet. His head ached. He could hardly see.
+Everything was licking at him, raging and whirling. His right arm
+would not move.
+
+Tasso pulled back toward him. "Come on. Let's go."
+
+"Klaus--He's still up there."
+
+"Come on!" Tasso dragged Hendricks back, away from the columns.
+Hendricks shook his head, trying to clear it. Tasso led him rapidly
+away, her eyes intense and bright, watching for claws that had escaped
+the blast.
+
+One David came out of the rolling clouds of flame. Tasso blasted it.
+No more appeared.
+
+"But Klaus. What about him?" Hendricks stopped, standing unsteadily.
+"He--"
+
+"Come on!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They retreated, moving farther and farther away from the bunker. A few
+small claws followed them for a little while and then gave up, turning
+back and going off.
+
+At last Tasso stopped. "We can stop here and get our breaths."
+
+Hendricks sat down on some heaps of debris. He wiped his neck,
+gasping. "We left Klaus back there."
+
+Tasso said nothing. She opened her gun, sliding a fresh round of blast
+cartridges into place.
+
+Hendricks stared at her, dazed. "You left him back there on purpose."
+
+Tasso snapped the gun together. She studied the heaps of rubble around
+them, her face expressionless. As if she were watching for something.
+
+"What is it?" Hendricks demanded. "What are you looking for? Is
+something coming?" He shook his head, trying to understand. What was
+she doing? What was she waiting for? He could see nothing. Ash lay all
+around them, ash and ruins. Occasional stark tree trunks, without
+leaves or branches. "What--"
+
+Tasso cut him off. "Be still." Her eyes narrowed. Suddenly her gun
+came up. Hendricks turned, following her gaze.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Back the way they had come a figure appeared. The figure walked
+unsteadily toward them. Its clothes were torn. It limped as it made
+its way along, going very slowly and carefully. Stopping now and then,
+resting and getting its strength. Once it almost fell. It stood for a
+moment, trying to steady itself. Then it came on.
+
+Klaus.
+
+Hendricks stood up. "Klaus!" He started toward him. "How the hell did
+you--"
+
+Tasso fired. Hendricks swung back. She fired again, the blast passing
+him, a searing line of heat. The beam caught Klaus in the chest. He
+exploded, gears and wheels flying. For a moment he continued to walk.
+Then he swayed back and forth. He crashed to the ground, his arms
+flung out. A few more wheels rolled away.
+
+Silence.
+
+Tasso turned to Hendricks. "Now you understand why he killed Rudi."
+
+Hendricks sat down again slowly. He shook his head. He was numb. He
+could not think.
+
+"Do you see?" Tasso said. "Do you understand?"
+
+Hendricks said nothing. Everything was slipping away from him, faster
+and faster. Darkness, rolling and plucking at him.
+
+He closed his eyes.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks opened his eyes slowly. His body ached all over. He tried to
+sit up but needles of pain shot through his arm and shoulder. He
+gasped.
+
+"Don't try to get up," Tasso said. She bent down, putting her cold
+hand against his forehead.
+
+It was night. A few stars glinted above, shining through the drifting
+clouds of ash. Hendricks lay back, his teeth locked. Tasso watched him
+impassively. She had built a fire with some wood and weeds. The fire
+licked feebly, hissing at a metal cup suspended over it. Everything
+was silent. Unmoving darkness, beyond the fire.
+
+"So he was the Second Variety," Hendricks murmured.
+
+"I had always thought so."
+
+"Why didn't you destroy him sooner?" he wanted to know.
+
+"You held me back." Tasso crossed to the fire to look into the metal
+cup. "Coffee. It'll be ready to drink in awhile."
+
+She came back and sat down beside him. Presently she opened her pistol
+and began to disassemble the firing mechanism, studying it intently.
+
+"This is a beautiful gun," Tasso said, half-aloud. "The construction
+is superb."
+
+"What about them? The claws."
+
+"The concussion from the bomb put most of them out of action. They're
+delicate. Highly organized, I suppose."
+
+"The Davids, too?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How did you happen to have a bomb like that?"
+
+Tasso shrugged. "We designed it. You shouldn't underestimate our
+technology, Major. Without such a bomb you and I would no longer
+exist."
+
+"Very useful."
+
+Tasso stretched out her legs, warming her feet in the heat of the
+fire. "It surprised me that you did not seem to understand, after he
+killed Rudi. Why did you think he--"
+
+"I told you. I thought he was afraid."
+
+"Really? You know, Major, for a little while I suspected you. Because
+you wouldn't let me kill him. I thought you might be protecting him."
+She laughed.
+
+"Are we safe here?" Hendricks asked presently.
+
+"For awhile. Until they get reinforcements from some other area."
+Tasso began to clean the interior of the gun with a bit of rag. She
+finished and pushed the mechanism back into place. She closed the gun,
+running her finger along the barrel.
+
+"We were lucky," Hendricks murmured.
+
+"Yes. Very lucky."
+
+"Thanks for pulling me away."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tasso did not answer. She glanced up at him, her eyes bright in the
+fire light. Hendricks examined his arm. He could not move his fingers.
+His whole side seemed numb. Down inside him was a dull steady ache.
+
+"How do you feel?" Tasso asked.
+
+"My arm is damaged."
+
+"Anything else?"
+
+"Internal injuries."
+
+"You didn't get down when the bomb went off."
+
+Hendricks said nothing. He watched Tasso pour the coffee from the cup
+into a flat metal pan. She brought it over to him.
+
+"Thanks." He struggled up enough to drink. It was hard to swallow. His
+insides turned over and he pushed the pan away. "That's all I can
+drink now."
+
+Tasso drank the rest. Time passed. The clouds of ash moved across the
+dark sky above them. Hendricks rested, his mind blank. After awhile he
+became aware that Tasso was standing over him, gazing down at him.
+
+"What is it?" he murmured.
+
+"Do you feel any better?"
+
+"Some."
+
+"You know, Major, if I hadn't dragged you away they would have got
+you. You would be dead. Like Rudi."
+
+"I know."
+
+"Do you want to know why I brought you out? I could have left you. I
+could have left you there."
+
+"Why did you bring me out?"
+
+"Because we have to get away from here." Tasso stirred the fire with a
+stick, peering calmly down into it. "No human being can live here.
+When their reinforcements come we won't have a chance. I've pondered
+about it while you were unconscious. We have perhaps three hours
+before they come."
+
+"And you expect me to get us away?"
+
+"That's right. I expect you to get us out of here."
+
+"Why me?"
+
+"Because I don't know any way." Her eyes shone at him in the
+half-light, bright and steady. "If you can't get us out of here
+they'll kill us within three hours. I see nothing else ahead. Well,
+Major? What are you going to do? I've been waiting all night. While
+you were unconscious I sat here, waiting and listening. It's almost
+dawn. The night is almost over."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks considered. "It's curious," he said at last.
+
+"Curious?"
+
+"That you should think I can get us out of here. I wonder what you
+think I can do."
+
+"Can you get us to the Moon Base?"
+
+"The Moon Base? How?"
+
+"There must be some way."
+
+Hendricks shook his head. "No. There's no way that I know of."
+
+Tasso said nothing. For a moment her steady gaze wavered. She ducked
+her head, turning abruptly away. She scrambled to her feet. "More
+coffee?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Suit yourself." Tasso drank silently. He could not see her face. He
+lay back against the ground, deep in thought, trying to concentrate.
+It was hard to think. His head still hurt. And the numbing daze still
+hung over him.
+
+"There might be one way," he said suddenly.
+
+"Oh?"
+
+"How soon is dawn?"
+
+"Two hours. The sun will be coming up shortly."
+
+"There's supposed to be a ship near here. I've never seen it. But I
+know it exists."
+
+"What kind of a ship?" Her voice was sharp.
+
+"A rocket cruiser."
+
+"Will it take us off? To the Moon Base?"
+
+"It's supposed to. In case of emergency." He rubbed his forehead.
+
+"What's wrong?"
+
+"My head. It's hard to think. I can hardly--hardly concentrate. The
+bomb."
+
+"Is the ship near here?" Tasso slid over beside him, settling down on
+her haunches. "How far is it? Where is it?"
+
+"I'm trying to think."
+
+Her fingers dug into his arm. "Nearby?" Her voice was like iron.
+"Where would it be? Would they store it underground? Hidden
+underground?"
+
+"Yes. In a storage locker."
+
+"How do we find it? Is it marked? Is there a code marker to identify
+it?"
+
+Hendricks concentrated. "No. No markings. No code symbol."
+
+"What, then?"
+
+"A sign."
+
+"What sort of sign?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hendricks did not answer. In the flickering light his eyes were
+glazed, two sightless orbs. Tasso's fingers dug into his arm.
+
+"What sort of sign? What is it?"
+
+"I--I can't think. Let me rest."
+
+"All right." She let go and stood up. Hendricks lay back against the
+ground, his eyes closed. Tasso walked away from him, her hands in her
+pockets. She kicked a rock out of her way and stood staring up at the
+sky. The night blackness was already beginning to fade into gray.
+Morning was coming.
+
+Tasso gripped her pistol and walked around the fire in a circle, back
+and forth. On the ground Major Hendricks lay, his eyes closed,
+unmoving. The grayness rose in the sky, higher and higher. The
+landscape became visible, fields of ash stretching out in all
+directions. Ash and ruins of buildings, a wall here and there, heaps
+of concrete, the naked trunk of a tree.
+
+The air was cold and sharp. Somewhere a long way off a bird made a few
+bleak sounds.
+
+Hendricks stirred. He opened his eyes. "Is it dawn? Already?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Hendricks sat up a little. "You wanted to know something. You were
+asking me."
+
+"Do you remember now?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What is it?" She tensed. "What?" she repeated sharply.
+
+"A well. A ruined well. It's in a storage locker under a well."
+
+"A well." Tasso relaxed. "Then we'll find a well." She looked at her
+watch. "We have about an hour, Major. Do you think we can find it in
+an hour?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Give me a hand up," Hendricks said.
+
+Tasso put her pistol away and helped him to his feet. "This is going
+to be difficult."
+
+"Yes it is." Hendricks set his lips tightly. "I don't think we're
+going to go very far."
+
+They began to walk. The early sun cast a little warmth down on them.
+The land was flat and barren, stretching out gray and lifeless as far
+as they could see. A few birds sailed silently, far above them,
+circling slowly.
+
+"See anything?" Hendricks said. "Any claws?"
+
+"No. Not yet."
+
+They passed through some ruins, upright concrete and bricks. A cement
+foundation. Rats scuttled away. Tasso jumped back warily.
+
+"This used to be a town," Hendricks said. "A village. Provincial
+village. This was all grape country, once. Where we are now."
+
+They came onto a ruined street, weeds and cracks criss-crossing it.
+Over to the right a stone chimney stuck up.
+
+"Be careful," he warned her.
+
+A pit yawned, an open basement. Ragged ends of pipes jutted up,
+twisted and bent. They passed part of a house, a bathtub turned on its
+side. A broken chair. A few spoons and bits of china dishes. In the
+center of the street the ground had sunk away. The depression was
+filled with weeds and debris and bones.
+
+"Over here," Hendricks murmured.
+
+"This way?"
+
+"To the right."
+
+They passed the remains of a heavy duty tank. Hendricks' belt counter
+clicked ominously. The tank had been radiation blasted. A few feet
+from the tank a mummified body lay sprawled out, mouth open. Beyond
+the road was a flat field. Stones and weeds, and bits of broken glass.
+
+"There," Hendricks said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A stone well jutted up, sagging and broken. A few boards lay across
+it. Most of the well had sunk into rubble. Hendricks walked unsteadily
+toward it, Tasso beside him.
+
+"Are you certain about this?" Tasso said. "This doesn't look like
+anything."
+
+"I'm sure." Hendricks sat down at the edge of the well, his teeth
+locked. His breath came quickly. He wiped perspiration from his face.
+"This was arranged so the senior command officer could get away. If
+anything happened. If the bunker fell."
+
+"That was you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Where is the ship? Is it here?"
+
+"We're standing on it." Hendricks ran his hands over the surface of
+the well stones. "The eye-lock responds to me, not to anybody else.
+It's my ship. Or it was supposed to be."
+
+There was a sharp click. Presently they heard a low grating sound from
+below them.
+
+"Step back," Hendricks said. He and Tasso moved away from the well.
+
+A section of the ground slid back. A metal frame pushed slowly up
+through the ash, shoving bricks and weeds out of the way. The action
+ceased, as the ship nosed into view.
+
+"There it is," Hendricks said.
+
+The ship was small. It rested quietly, suspended in its mesh frame,
+like a blunt needle. A rain of ash sifted down into the dark cavity
+from which the ship had been raised. Hendricks made his way over to
+it. He mounted the mesh and unscrewed the hatch, pulling it back.
+Inside the ship the control banks and the pressure seat were visible.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tasso came and stood beside him, gazing into the ship. "I'm not
+accustomed to rocket piloting," she said, after awhile.
+
+Hendricks glanced at her. "I'll do the piloting."
+
+"Will you? There's only one seat, Major. I can see it's built to carry
+only a single person."
+
+Hendricks' breathing changed. He studied the interior of the ship
+intently. Tasso was right. There was only one seat. The ship was built
+to carry only one person. "I see," he said slowly. "And the one person
+is you."
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"_You_ can't go. You might not live through the trip. You're injured.
+You probably wouldn't get there."
+
+"An interesting point. But you see, I know where the Moon Base is. And
+you don't. You might fly around for months and not find it. It's well
+hidden. Without knowing what to look for--"
+
+"I'll have to take my chances. Maybe I won't find it. Not by myself.
+But I think you'll give me all the information I need. Your life
+depends on it."
+
+"How?"
+
+"If I find the Moon Base in time, perhaps I can get them to send a
+ship back to pick you up. _If_ I find the Base in time. If not, then
+you haven't a chance. I imagine there are supplies on the ship. They
+will last me long enough--"
+
+Hendricks moved quickly. But his injured arm betrayed him. Tasso
+ducked, sliding lithely aside. Her hand came up, lightning fast.
+Hendricks saw the gun butt coming. He tried to ward off the blow, but
+she was too fast. The metal butt struck against the side of his head,
+just above his ear. Numbing pain rushed through him. Pain and rolling
+clouds of blackness. He sank down, sliding to the ground.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Dimly, he was aware that Tasso was standing over him, kicking him with
+her toe.
+
+"Major! Wake up."
+
+He opened his eyes, groaning.
+
+"Listen to me." She bent down, the gun pointed at his face. "I have to
+hurry. There isn't much time left. The ship is ready to go, but you
+must tell me the information I need before I leave."
+
+Hendricks shook his head, trying to clear it.
+
+"Hurry up! Where is the Moon Base? How do I find it? What do I look
+for?"
+
+Hendricks said nothing.
+
+"Answer me!"
+
+"Sorry."
+
+"Major, the ship is loaded with provisions. I can coast for weeks.
+I'll find the Base eventually. And in a half hour you'll be dead. Your
+only chance of survival--" She broke off.
+
+Along the slope, by some crumbling ruins, something moved. Something
+in the ash. Tasso turned quickly, aiming. She fired. A puff of flame
+leaped. Something scuttled away, rolling across the ash. She fired
+again. The claw burst apart, wheels flying.
+
+"See?" Tasso said. "A scout. It won't be long."
+
+"You'll bring them back here to get me?"
+
+"Yes. As soon as possible."
+
+Hendricks looked up at her. He studied her intently. "You're telling
+the truth?" A strange expression had come over his face, an avid
+hunger. "You will come back for me? You'll get me to the Moon Base?"
+
+"I'll get you to the Moon Base. But tell me where it is! There's only
+a little time left."
+
+"All right." Hendricks picked up a piece of rock, pulling himself to a
+sitting position. "Watch."
+
+Hendricks began to scratch in the ash. Tasso stood by him, watching
+the motion of the rock. Hendricks was sketching a crude lunar map.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"This is the Appenine range. Here is the Crater of Archimedes. The
+Moon Base is beyond the end of the Appenine, about two hundred miles.
+I don't know exactly where. No one on Terra knows. But when you're
+over the Appenine, signal with one red flare and a green flare,
+followed by two red flares in quick succession. The Base monitor will
+record your signal. The Base is under the surface, of course. They'll
+guide you down with magnetic grapples."
+
+"And the controls? Can I operate them?"
+
+"The controls are virtually automatic. All you have to do is give the
+right signal at the right time."
+
+"I will."
+
+"The seat absorbs most of the take-off shock. Air and temperature are
+automatically controlled. The ship will leave Terra and pass out into
+free space. It'll line itself up with the moon, falling into an orbit
+around it, about a hundred miles above the surface. The orbit will
+carry you over the Base. When you're in the region of the Appenine,
+release the signal rockets."
+
+Tasso slid into the ship and lowered herself into the pressure seat.
+The arm locks folded automatically around her. She fingered the
+controls. "Too bad you're not going, Major. All this put here for you,
+and you can't make the trip."
+
+"Leave me the pistol."
+
+Tasso pulled the pistol from her belt. She held it in her hand,
+weighing it thoughtfully. "Don't go too far from this location. It'll
+be hard to find you, as it is."
+
+"No. I'll stay here by the well."
+
+Tasso gripped the take-off switch, running her fingers over the smooth
+metal. "A beautiful ship, Major. Well built. I admire your
+workmanship. You people have always done good work. You build fine
+things. Your work, your creations, are your greatest achievement."
+
+"Give me the pistol," Hendricks said impatiently, holding out his
+hand. He struggled to his feet.
+
+"Good-bye, Major." Tasso tossed the pistol past Hendricks. The pistol
+clattered against the ground, bouncing and rolling away. Hendricks
+hurried after it. He bent down, snatching it up.
+
+The hatch of the ship clanged shut. The bolts fell into place.
+Hendricks made his way back. The inner door was being sealed. He
+raised the pistol unsteadily.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There was a shattering roar. The ship burst up from its metal cage,
+fusing the mesh behind it. Hendricks cringed, pulling back. The ship
+shot up into the rolling clouds of ash, disappearing into the sky.
+
+Hendricks stood watching a long time, until even the streamer had
+dissipated. Nothing stirred. The morning air was chill and silent. He
+began to walk aimlessly back the way they had come. Better to keep
+moving around. It would be a long time before help came--if it came at
+all.
+
+He searched his pockets until he found a package of cigarettes. He lit
+one grimly. They had all wanted cigarettes from him. But cigarettes
+were scarce.
+
+A lizard slithered by him, through the ash. He halted, rigid. The
+lizard disappeared. Above, the sun rose higher in the sky. Some flies
+landed on a flat rock to one side of him. Hendricks kicked at them
+with his foot.
+
+It was getting hot. Sweat trickled down his face, into his collar. His
+mouth was dry.
+
+Presently he stopped walking and sat down on some debris. He
+unfastened his medicine kit and swallowed a few narcotic capsules. He
+looked around him. Where was he?
+
+Something lay ahead. Stretched out on the ground. Silent and unmoving.
+
+Hendricks drew his gun quickly. It looked like a man. Then he
+remembered. It was the remains of Klaus. The Second Variety. Where
+Tasso had blasted him. He could see wheels and relays and metal parts,
+strewn around on the ash. Glittering and sparkling in the sunlight.
+
+Hendricks got to his feet and walked over. He nudged the inert form
+with his foot, turning it over a little. He could see the metal hull,
+the aluminum ribs and struts. More wiring fell out. Like viscera.
+Heaps of wiring, switches and relays. Endless motors and rods.
+
+He bent down. The brain cage had been smashed by the fall. The
+artificial brain was visible. He gazed at it. A maze of circuits.
+Miniature tubes. Wires as fine as hair. He touched the brain cage. It
+swung aside. The type plate was visible. Hendricks studied the plate.
+
+And blanched.
+
+IV--IV.
+
+For a long time he stared at the plate. Fourth Variety. Not the
+Second. They had been wrong. There were more types. Not just three.
+Many more, perhaps. At least four. And Klaus wasn't the Second
+Variety.
+
+But if Klaus wasn't the Second Variety--
+
+Suddenly he tensed. Something was coming, walking through the ash
+beyond the hill. What was it? He strained to see. Figures. Figures
+coming slowly along, making their way through the ash.
+
+Coming toward him.
+
+Hendricks crouched quickly, raising his gun. Sweat dripped down into
+his eyes. He fought down rising panic, as the figures neared.
+
+The first was a David. The David saw him and increased its pace. The
+others hurried behind it. A second David. A third. Three Davids, all
+alike, coming toward him silently, without expression, their thin legs
+rising and falling. Clutching their teddy bears.
+
+He aimed and fired. The first two Davids dissolved into particles. The
+third came on. And the figure behind it. Climbing silently toward him
+across the gray ash. A Wounded Soldier, towering over the David. And--
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And behind the Wounded Soldier came two Tassos, walking side by side.
+Heavy belt, Russian army pants, shirt, long hair. The familiar figure,
+as he had seen her only a little while before. Sitting in the pressure
+seat of the ship. Two slim, silent figures, both identical.
+
+They were very near. The David bent down suddenly, dropping its teddy
+bear. The bear raced across the ground. Automatically, Hendricks'
+fingers tightened around the trigger. The bear was gone, dissolved
+into mist. The two Tasso Types moved on, expressionless, walking side
+by side, through the gray ash.
+
+When they were almost to him, Hendricks raised the pistol waist high
+and fired.
+
+The two Tassos dissolved. But already a new group was starting up the
+rise, five or six Tassos, all identical, a line of them coming rapidly
+toward him.
+
+And he had given her the ship and the signal code. Because of him she
+was on her way to the moon, to the Moon Base. He had made it possible.
+
+He had been right about the bomb, after all. It had been designed with
+knowledge of the other types, the David Type and the Wounded Soldier
+Type. And the Klaus Type. Not designed by human beings. It had been
+designed by one of the underground factories, apart from all human
+contact.
+
+The line of Tassos came up to him. Hendricks braced himself, watching
+them calmly. The familiar face, the belt, the heavy shirt, the bomb
+carefully in place.
+
+The bomb--
+
+As the Tassos reached for him, a last ironic thought drifted through
+Hendricks' mind. He felt a little better, thinking about it. The bomb.
+Made by the Second Variety to destroy the other varieties. Made for
+that end alone.
+
+They were already beginning to design weapons to use against each
+other.
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/data/pg32522.txt

+Kramer leaned back. "You can see the situation. How can we deal with a
+factor like this? The perfect variable."
+
+"Perfect? Prediction should still be possible. A living thing still
+acts from necessity, the same as inanimate material. But the
+cause-effect chain is more subtle; there are more factors to be
+considered. The difference is quantitative, I think. The reaction of
+the living organism parallels natural causation, but with greater
+complexity."
+
+Gross and Kramer looked up at the board plates, suspended on the wall,
+still dripping, the images hardening into place. Kramer traced a line
+with his pencil.
+
+"See that? It's a pseudopodium. They're alive, and so far, a weapon we
+can't beat. No mechanical system can compete with that, simple or
+intricate. We'll have to scrap the Johnson Control and find something
+else."
+
+"Meanwhile the war continues as it is. Stalemate. Checkmate. They
+can't get to us, and we can't get through their living minefield."
+
+Kramer nodded. "It's a perfect defense, for them. But there still
+might be one answer."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Wait a minute." Kramer turned to his rocket expert, sitting with the
+charts and files. "The heavy cruiser that returned this week. It
+didn't actually touch, did it? It came close but there was no
+contact."
+
+"Correct." The expert nodded. "The mine was twenty miles off. The
+cruiser was in space-drive, moving directly toward Proxima,
+line-straight, using the Johnson Control, of course. It had deflected
+a quarter of an hour earlier for reasons unknown. Later it resumed its
+course. That was when they got it."
+
+"It shifted," Kramer said. "But not enough. The mine was coming along
+after it, trailing it. It's the same old story, but I wonder about the
+contact."
+
+"Here's our theory," the expert said. "We keep looking for contact, a
+trigger in the pseudopodium. But more likely we're witnessing a
+psychological phenomena, a decision without any physical correlative.
+We're watching for something that isn't there. The mine _decides_ to
+blow up. It sees our ship, approaches, and then decides."
+
+"Thanks." Kramer turned to Gross. "Well, that confirms what I'm
+saying. How can a ship guided by automatic relays escape a mine that
+decides to explode? The whole theory of mine penetration is that you
+must avoid tripping the trigger. But here the trigger is a state of
+mind in a complicated, developed life-form."
+
+"The belt is fifty thousand miles deep," Gross added. "It solves
+another problem for them, repair and maintenance. The damn things
+reproduce, fill up the spaces by spawning into them. I wonder what
+they feed on?"
+
+"Probably the remains of our first-line. The big cruisers must be a
+delicacy. It's a game of wits, between a living creature and a ship
+piloted by automatic relays. The ship always loses." Kramer opened a
+folder. "I'll tell you what I suggest."
+
+"Go on," Gross said. "I've already heard ten solutions today. What's
+yours?"
+
+"Mine is very simple. These creatures are superior to any mechanical
+system, but only because they're alive. Almost any other life-form
+could compete with them, any higher life-form. If the yuks can put out
+living mines to protect their planets, we ought to be able to harness
+some of our own life-forms in a similar way. Let's make use of the
+same weapon ourselves."
+
+"Which life-form do you propose to use?"
+
+"I think the human brain is the most agile of known living forms. Do
+you know of any better?"
+
+"But no human being can withstand outspace travel. A human pilot would
+be dead of heart failure long before the ship got anywhere near
+Proxima."
+
+"But we don't need the whole body," Kramer said. "We need only the
+brain."
+
+"What?"
+
+"The problem is to find a person of high intelligence who would
+contribute, in the same manner that eyes and arms are volunteered."
+
+"But a brain...."
+
+"Technically, it could be done. Brains have been transferred several
+times, when body destruction made it necessary. Of course, to a
+spaceship, to a heavy outspace cruiser, instead of an artificial body,
+that's new."
+
+The room was silent.
+
+"It's quite an idea," Gross said slowly. His heavy square face
+twisted. "But even supposing it might work, the big question is
+_whose_ brain?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was all very confusing, the reasons for the war, the nature of the
+enemy. The Yucconae had been contacted on one of the outlying planets
+of Proxima Centauri. At the approach of the Terran ship, a host of
+dark slim pencils had lifted abruptly and shot off into the distance.
+The first real encounter came between three of the yuk pencils and a
+single exploration ship from Terra. No Terrans survived. After that it
+was all out war, with no holds barred.
+
+Both sides feverishly constructed defense rings around their systems.
+Of the two, the Yucconae belt was the better. The ring around Proxima
+was a living ring, superior to anything Terra could throw against it.
+The standard equipment by which Terran ships were guided in outspace,
+the Johnson Control, was not adequate. Something more was needed.
+Automatic relays were not good enough.
+
+--Not good at all, Kramer thought to himself, as he stood looking down
+the hillside at the work going on below him. A warm wind blew along
+the hill, rustling the weeds and grass. At the bottom, in the valley,
+the mechanics had almost finished; the last elements of the reflex
+system had been removed from the ship and crated up.
+
+All that was needed now was the new core, the new central key that
+would take the place of the mechanical system. A human brain, the
+brain of an intelligent, wary human being. But would the human being
+part with it? That was the problem.
+
+Kramer turned. Two people were approaching him along the road, a man
+and a woman. The man was Gross, expressionless, heavy-set, walking
+with dignity. The woman was--He stared in surprise and growing
+annoyance. It was Dolores, his wife. Since they'd separated he had
+seen little of her....
+
+"Kramer," Gross said. "Look who I ran into. Come back down with us.
+We're going into town."
+
+"Hello, Phil," Dolores said. "Well, aren't you glad to see me?"
+
+He nodded. "How have you been? You're looking fine." She was still
+pretty and slender in her uniform, the blue-grey of Internal Security,
+Gross' organization.
+
+"Thanks." She smiled. "You seem to be doing all right, too. Commander
+Gross tells me that you're responsible for this project, Operation
+Head, as they call it. Whose head have you decided on?"
+
+"That's the problem." Kramer lit a cigarette. "This ship is to be
+equipped with a human brain instead of the Johnson system. We've
+constructed special draining baths for the brain, electronic relays to
+catch the impulses and magnify them, a continual feeding duct that
+supplies the living cells with everything they need. But--"
+
+"But we still haven't got the brain itself," Gross finished. They
+began to walk back toward the car. "If we can get that we'll be ready
+for the tests."
+
+"Will the brain remain alive?" Dolores asked. "Is it actually going to
+live as part of the ship?"
+
+"It will be alive, but not conscious. Very little life is actually
+conscious. Animals, trees, insects are quick in their responses, but
+they aren't conscious. In this process of ours the individual
+personality, the ego, will cease. We only need the response ability,
+nothing more."
+
+Dolores shuddered. "How terrible!"
+
+"In time of war everything must be tried," Kramer said absently. "If
+one life sacrificed will end the war it's worth it. This ship might
+get through. A couple more like it and there wouldn't be any more
+war."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They got into the car. As they drove down the road, Gross said, "Have
+you thought of anyone yet?"
+
+Kramer shook his head. "That's out of my line."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I'm an engineer. It's not in my department."
+
+"But all this was your idea."
+
+"My work ends there."
+
+Gross was staring at him oddly. Kramer shifted uneasily.
+
+"Then who is supposed to do it?" Gross said. "I can have my
+organization prepare examinations of various kinds, to determine
+fitness, that kind of thing--"
+
+"Listen, Phil," Dolores said suddenly.
+
+"What?"
+
+She turned toward him. "I have an idea. Do you remember that professor
+we had in college. Michael Thomas?"
+
+Kramer nodded.
+
+"I wonder if he's still alive." Dolores frowned. "If he is he must be
+awfully old."
+
+"Why, Dolores?" Gross asked.
+
+"Perhaps an old person who didn't have much time left, but whose mind
+was still clear and sharp--"
+
+"Professor Thomas." Kramer rubbed his jaw. "He certainly was a wise
+old duck. But could he still be alive? He must have been seventy,
+then."
+
+"We could find that out," Gross said. "I could make a routine check."
+
+"What do you think?" Dolores said. "If any human mind could outwit
+those creatures--"
+
+"I don't like the idea," Kramer said. In his mind an image had
+appeared, the image of an old man sitting behind a desk, his bright
+gentle eyes moving about the classroom. The old man leaning forward, a
+thin hand raised--
+
+"Keep him out of this," Kramer said.
+
+"What's wrong?" Gross looked at him curiously.
+
+"It's because _I_ suggested it," Dolores said.
+
+"No." Kramer shook his head. "It's not that. I didn't expect anything
+like this, somebody I knew, a man I studied under. I remember him very
+clearly. He was a very distinct personality."
+
+"Good," Gross said. "He sounds fine."
+
+"We can't do it. We're asking his death!"
+
+"This is war," Gross said, "and war doesn't wait on the needs of the
+individual. You said that yourself. Surely he'll volunteer; we can
+keep it on that basis."
+
+"He may already be dead," Dolores murmured.
+
+"We'll find that out," Gross said speeding up the car. They drove the
+rest of the way in silence.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a long time the two of them stood studying the small wood house,
+overgrown with ivy, set back on the lot behind an enormous oak. The
+little town was silent and sleepy; once in awhile a car moved slowly
+along the distant highway, but that was all.
+
+"This is the place," Gross said to Kramer. He folded his arms. "Quite
+a quaint little house."
+
+Kramer said nothing. The two Security Agents behind them were
+expressionless.
+
+Gross started toward the gate. "Let's go. According to the check he's
+still alive, but very sick. His mind is agile, however. That seems to
+be certain. It's said he doesn't leave the house. A woman takes care
+of his needs. He's very frail."
+
+They went down the stone walk and up onto the porch. Gross rang the
+bell. They waited. After a time they heard slow footsteps. The door
+opened. An elderly woman in a shapeless wrapper studied them
+impassively.
+
+"Security," Gross said, showing his card. "We wish to see Professor
+Thomas."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Government business." He glanced at Kramer.
+
+Kramer stepped forward. "I was a pupil of the Professor's," he said.
+"I'm sure he won't mind seeing us."
+
+The woman hesitated uncertainly. Gross stepped into the doorway. "All
+right, mother. This is war time. We can't stand out here."
+
+The two Security agents followed him, and Kramer came reluctantly
+behind, closing the door. Gross stalked down the hall until he came to
+an open door. He stopped, looking in. Kramer could see the white
+corner of a bed, a wooden post and the edge of a dresser.
+
+He joined Gross.
+
+In the dark room a withered old man lay, propped up on endless
+pillows. At first it seemed as if he were asleep; there was no motion
+or sign of life. But after a time Kramer saw with a faint shock that
+the old man was watching them intently, his eyes fixed on them,
+unmoving, unwinking.
+
+"Professor Thomas?" Gross said. "I'm Commander Gross of Security. This
+man with me is perhaps known to you--"
+
+The faded eyes fixed on Kramer.
+
+"I know him. Philip Kramer.... You've grown heavier, boy." The voice
+was feeble, the rustle of dry ashes. "Is it true you're married now?"
+
+"Yes. I married Dolores French. You remember her." Kramer came toward
+the bed. "But we're separated. It didn't work out very well. Our
+careers--"
+
+"What we came here about, Professor," Gross began, but Kramer cut him
+off with an impatient wave.
+
+"Let me talk. Can't you and your men get out of here long enough to
+let me talk to him?"
+
+Gross swallowed. "All right, Kramer." He nodded to the two men. The
+three of them left the room, going out into the hall and closing the
+door after them.
+
+The old man in the bed watched Kramer silently. "I don't think much of
+him," he said at last. "I've seen his type before. What's he want?"
+
+"Nothing. He just came along. Can I sit down?" Kramer found a stiff
+upright chair beside the bed. "If I'm bothering you--"
+
+"No. I'm glad to see you again, Philip. After so long. I'm sorry your
+marriage didn't work out."
+
+"How have you been?"
+
+"I've been very ill. I'm afraid that my moment on the world's stage
+has almost ended." The ancient eyes studied the younger man
+reflectively. "You look as if you have been doing well. Like everyone
+else I thought highly of. You've gone to the top in this society."
+
+Kramer smiled. Then he became serious. "Professor, there's a project
+we're working on that I want to talk to you about. It's the first ray
+of hope we've had in this whole war. If it works, we may be able to
+crack the yuk defenses, get some ships into their system. If we can do
+that the war might be brought to an end."
+
+"Go on. Tell me about it, if you wish."
+
+"It's a long shot, this project. It may not work at all, but we have
+to give it a try."
+
+"It's obvious that you came here because of it," Professor Thomas
+murmured. "I'm becoming curious. Go on."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+After Kramer finished the old man lay back in the bed without
+speaking. At last he sighed.
+
+"I understand. A human mind, taken out of a human body." He sat up a
+little, looking at Kramer. "I suppose you're thinking of me."
+
+Kramer said nothing.
+
+"Before I make my decision I want to see the papers on this, the
+theory and outline of construction. I'm not sure I like it.--For
+reasons of my own, I mean. But I want to look at the material. If
+you'll do that--"
+
+"Certainly." Kramer stood up and went to the door. Gross and the two
+Security Agents were standing outside, waiting tensely. "Gross, come
+inside."
+
+They filed into the room.
+
+"Give the Professor the papers," Kramer said. "He wants to study them
+before deciding."
+
+Gross brought the file out of his coat pocket, a manila envelope. He
+handed it to the old man on the bed. "Here it is, Professor. You're
+welcome to examine it. Will you give us your answer as soon as
+possible? We're very anxious to begin, of course."
+
+"I'll give you my answer when I've decided." He took the envelope with
+a thin, trembling hand. "My decision depends on what I find out from
+these papers. If I don't like what I find, then I will not become
+involved with this work in any shape or form." He opened the envelope
+with shaking hands. "I'm looking for one thing."
+
+"What is it?" Gross said.
+
+"That's my affair. Leave me a number by which I can reach you when
+I've decided."
+
+Silently, Gross put his card down on the dresser. As they went out
+Professor Thomas was already reading the first of the papers, the
+outline of the theory.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kramer sat across from Dale Winter, his second in line. "What then?"
+Winter said.
+
+"He's going to contact us." Kramer scratched with a drawing pen on
+some paper. "I don't know what to think."
+
+"What do you mean?" Winter's good-natured face was puzzled.
+
+"Look." Kramer stood up, pacing back and forth, his hands in his
+uniform pockets. "He was my teacher in college. I respected him as a
+man, as well as a teacher. He was more than a voice, a talking book.
+He was a person, a calm, kindly person I could look up to. I always
+wanted to be like him, someday. Now look at me."
+
+"So?"
+
+"Look at what I'm asking. I'm asking for his life, as if he were some
+kind of laboratory animal kept around in a cage, not a man, a teacher
+at all."
+
+"Do you think he'll do it?"
+
+"I don't know." Kramer went to the window. He stood looking out. "In a
+way, I hope not."
+
+"But if he doesn't--"
+
+"Then we'll have to find somebody else. I know. There would be
+somebody else. Why did Dolores have to--"
+
+The vidphone rang. Kramer pressed the button.
+
+"This is Gross." The heavy features formed. "The old man called me.
+Professor Thomas."
+
+"What did he say?" He knew; he could tell already, by the sound of
+Gross' voice.
+
+"He said he'd do it. I was a little surprised myself, but apparently
+he means it. We've already made arrangements for his admission to the
+hospital. His lawyer is drawing up the statement of liability."
+
+Kramer only half heard. He nodded wearily. "All right. I'm glad. I
+suppose we can go ahead, then."
+
+"You don't sound very glad."
+
+"I wonder why he decided to go ahead with it."
+
+"He was very certain about it." Gross sounded pleased. "He called me
+quite early. I was still in bed. You know, this calls for a
+celebration."
+
+"Sure," Kramer said. "It sure does."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Toward the middle of August the project neared completion. They stood
+outside in the hot autumn heat, looking up at the sleek metal sides of
+the ship.
+
+Gross thumped the metal with his hand. "Well, it won't be long. We can
+begin the test any time."
+
+"Tell us more about this," an officer in gold braid said. "It's such
+an unusual concept."
+
+"Is there really a human brain inside the ship?" a dignitary asked, a
+small man in a rumpled suit. "And the brain is actually alive?"
+
+"Gentlemen, this ship is guided by a living brain instead of the usual
+Johnson relay-control system. But the brain is not conscious. It will
+function by reflex only. The practical difference between it and the
+Johnson system is this: a human brain is far more intricate than any
+man-made structure, and its ability to adapt itself to a situation, to
+respond to danger, is far beyond anything that could be artificially
+built."
+
+Gross paused, cocking his ear. The turbines of the ship were beginning
+to rumble, shaking the ground under them with a deep vibration. Kramer
+was standing a short distance away from the others, his arms folded,
+watching silently. At the sound of the turbines he walked quickly
+around the ship to the other side. A few workmen were clearing away
+the last of the waste, the scraps of wiring and scaffolding. They
+glanced up at him and went on hurriedly with their work. Kramer
+mounted the ramp and entered the control cabin of the ship. Winter was
+sitting at the controls with a Pilot from Space-transport.
+
+"How's it look?" Kramer asked.
+
+"All right." Winter got up. "He tells me that it would be best to take
+off manually. The robot controls--" Winter hesitated. "I mean, the
+built-in controls, can take over later on in space."
+
+"That's right," the Pilot said. "It's customary with the Johnson
+system, and so in this case we should--"
+
+"Can you tell anything yet?" Kramer asked.
+
+"No," the Pilot said slowly. "I don't think so. I've been going over
+everything. It seems to be in good order. There's only one thing I
+wanted to ask you about." He put his hand on the control board. "There
+are some changes here I don't understand."
+
+"Changes?"
+
+"Alterations from the original design. I wonder what the purpose is."
+
+Kramer took a set of the plans from his coat. "Let me look." He turned
+the pages over. The Pilot watched carefully over his shoulder.
+
+"The changes aren't indicated on your copy," the Pilot said. "I
+wonder--" He stopped. Commander Gross had entered the control cabin.
+
+"Gross, who authorized alterations?" Kramer said. "Some of the wiring
+has been changed."
+
+"Why, your old friend." Gross signaled to the field tower through the
+window.
+
+"My old friend?"
+
+"The Professor. He took quite an active interest." Gross turned to the
+Pilot. "Let's get going. We have to take this out past gravity for the
+test they tell me. Well, perhaps it's for the best. Are you ready?"
+
+"Sure." The Pilot sat down and moved some of the controls around.
+"Anytime."
+
+"Go ahead, then," Gross said.
+
+"The Professor--" Kramer began, but at that moment there was a
+tremendous roar and the ship leaped under him. He grasped one of the
+wall holds and hung on as best he could. The cabin was filling with a
+steady throbbing, the raging of the jet turbines underneath them.
+
+The ship leaped. Kramer closed his eyes and held his breath. They were
+moving out into space, gaining speed each moment.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Well, what do you think?" Winter said nervously. "Is it time yet?"
+
+"A little longer," Kramer said. He was sitting on the floor of the
+cabin, down by the control wiring. He had removed the metal
+covering-plate, exposing the complicated maze of relay wiring. He was
+studying it, comparing it to the wiring diagrams.
+
+"What's the matter?" Gross said.
+
+"These changes. I can't figure out what they're for. The only pattern
+I can make out is that for some reason--"
+
+"Let me look," the Pilot said. He squatted down beside Kramer. "You
+were saying?"
+
+"See this lead here? Originally it was switch controlled. It closed
+and opened automatically, according to temperature change. Now it's
+wired so that the central control system operates it. The same with
+the others. A lot of this was still mechanical, worked by pressure,
+temperature, stress. Now it's under the central master."
+
+"The brain?" Gross said. "You mean it's been altered so that the brain
+manipulates it?"
+
+Kramer nodded. "Maybe Professor Thomas felt that no mechanical relays
+could be trusted. Maybe he thought that things would be happening too
+fast. But some of these could close in a split second. The brake
+rockets could go on as quickly as--"
+
+"Hey," Winter said from the control seat. "We're getting near the moon
+stations. What'll I do?"
+
+They looked out the port. The corroded surface of the moon gleamed up
+at them, a corrupt and sickening sight. They were moving swiftly toward
+it.
+
+"I'll take it," the Pilot said. He eased Winter out of the way and
+strapped himself in place. The ship began to move away from the moon
+as he manipulated the controls. Down below them they could see the
+observation stations dotting the surface, and the tiny squares that
+were the openings of the underground factories and hangars. A red
+blinker winked up at them and the Pilot's fingers moved on the board
+in answer.
+
+"We're past the moon," the Pilot said, after a time. The moon had
+fallen behind them; the ship was heading into outer space. "Well, we
+can go ahead with it."
+
+Kramer did not answer.
+
+"Mr. Kramer, we can go ahead any time."
+
+Kramer started. "Sorry. I was thinking. All right, thanks." He
+frowned, deep in thought.
+
+"What is it?" Gross asked.
+
+"The wiring changes. Did you understand the reason for them when you
+gave the okay to the workmen?"
+
+Gross flushed. "You know I know nothing about technical material. I'm
+in Security."
+
+"Then you should have consulted me."
+
+"What does it matter?" Gross grinned wryly. "We're going to have to
+start putting our faith in the old man sooner or later."
+
+The Pilot stepped back from the board. His face was pale and set.
+"Well, it's done," he said. "That's it."
+
+"What's done?" Kramer said.
+
+"We're on automatic. The brain. I turned the board over to it--to him,
+I mean. The Old Man." The Pilot lit a cigarette and puffed nervously.
+"Let's keep our fingers crossed."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The ship was coasting evenly, in the hands of its invisible pilot. Far
+down inside the ship, carefully armoured and protected, a soft human
+brain lay in a tank of liquid, a thousand minute electric charges
+playing over its surface. As the charges rose they were picked up and
+amplified, fed into relay systems, advanced, carried on through the
+entire ship--
+
+Gross wiped his forehead nervously. "So _he_ is running it, now. I
+hope he knows what he's doing."
+
+Kramer nodded enigmatically. "I think he does."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Nothing." Kramer walked to the port. "I see we're still moving in a
+straight line." He picked up the microphone. "We can instruct the
+brain orally, through this." He blew against the microphone
+experimentally.
+
+"Go on," Winter said.
+
+"Bring the ship around half-right," Kramer said. "Decrease speed."
+
+They waited. Time passed. Gross looked at Kramer. "No change.
+Nothing."
+
+"Wait."
+
+Slowly, the ship was beginning to turn. The turbines missed, reducing
+their steady beat. The ship was taking up its new course, adjusting
+itself. Nearby some space debris rushed past, incinerating in the
+blasts of the turbine jets.
+
+"So far so good," Gross said.
+
+They began to breathe more easily. The invisible pilot had taken
+control smoothly, calmly. The ship was in good hands. Kramer spoke a
+few more words into the microphone, and they swung again. Now they
+were moving back the way they had come, toward the moon.
+
+"Let's see what he does when we enter the moon's pull," Kramer said.
+"He was a good mathematician, the old man. He could handle any kind of
+problem."
+
+The ship veered, turning away from the moon. The great eaten-away
+globe fell behind them.
+
+Gross breathed a sigh of relief. "That's that."
+
+"One more thing." Kramer picked up the microphone. "Return to the moon
+and land the ship at the first space field," he said into it.
+
+"Good Lord," Winter murmured. "Why are you--"
+
+"Be quiet." Kramer stood, listening. The turbines gasped and roared as
+the ship swung full around, gaining speed. They were moving back, back
+toward the moon again. The ship dipped down, heading toward the great
+globe below.
+
+"We're going a little fast," the Pilot said. "I don't see how he can
+put down at this velocity."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The port filled up, as the globe swelled rapidly. The Pilot hurried
+toward the board, reaching for the controls. All at once the ship
+jerked. The nose lifted and the ship shot out into space, away from
+the moon, turning at an oblique angle. The men were thrown to the
+floor by the sudden change in course. They got to their feet again,
+speechless, staring at each other.
+
+The Pilot gazed down at the board. "It wasn't me! I didn't touch a
+thing. I didn't even get to it."
+
+The ship was gaining speed each moment. Kramer hesitated. "Maybe you
+better switch it back to manual."
+
+The Pilot closed the switch. He took hold of the steering controls and
+moved them experimentally. "Nothing." He turned around. "Nothing. It
+doesn't respond."
+
+No one spoke.
+
+"You can see what has happened," Kramer said calmly. "The old man
+won't let go of it, now that he has it. I was afraid of this when I
+saw the wiring changes. Everything in this ship is centrally
+controlled, even the cooling system, the hatches, the garbage release.
+We're helpless."
+
+"Nonsense." Gross strode to the board. He took hold of the wheel and
+turned it. The ship continued on its course, moving away from the
+moon, leaving it behind.
+
+"Release!" Kramer said into the microphone. "Let go of the controls!
+We'll take it back. Release."
+
+"No good," the Pilot said. "Nothing." He spun the useless wheel. "It's
+dead, completely dead."
+
+"And we're still heading out," Winter said, grinning foolishly. "We'll
+be going through the first-line defense belt in a few minutes. If they
+don't shoot us down--"
+
+"We better radio back." The Pilot clicked the radio to _send_. "I'll
+contact the main bases, one of the observation stations."
+
+"Better get the defense belt, at the speed we're going. We'll be into
+it in a minute."
+
+"And after that," Kramer said, "we'll be in outer space. He's moving
+us toward outspace velocity. Is this ship equipped with baths?"
+
+"Baths?" Gross said.
+
+"The sleep tanks. For space-drive. We may need them if we go much
+faster."
+
+"But good God, where are we going?" Gross said. "Where--where's he
+taking us?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Pilot obtained contact. "This is Dwight, on ship," he said. "We're
+entering the defense zone at high velocity. Don't fire on us."
+
+"Turn back," the impersonal voice came through the speaker. "You're
+not allowed in the defense zone."
+
+"We can't. We've lost control."
+
+"Lost control?"
+
+"This is an experimental ship."
+
+Gross took the radio. "This is Commander Gross, Security. We're being
+carried into outer space. There's nothing we can do. Is there any way
+that we can be removed from this ship?"
+
+A hesitation. "We have some fast pursuit ships that could pick you up
+if you wanted to jump. The chances are good they'd find you. Do you
+have space flares?"
+
+"We do," the Pilot said. "Let's try it."
+
+"Abandon ship?" Kramer said. "If we leave now we'll never see it
+again."
+
+"What else can we do? We're gaining speed all the time. Do you propose
+that we stay here?"
+
+"No." Kramer shook his head. "Damn it, there ought to be a better
+solution."
+
+"Could you contact _him_?" Winter asked. "The Old Man? Try to reason
+with him?"
+
+"It's worth a chance," Gross said. "Try it."
+
+"All right." Kramer took the microphone. He paused a moment. "Listen!
+Can you hear me? This is Phil Kramer. Can you hear me, Professor. Can
+you hear me? I want you to release the controls."
+
+There was silence.
+
+"This is Kramer, Professor. Can you hear me? Do you remember who I am?
+Do you understand who this is?"
+
+Above the control panel the wall speaker made a sound, a sputtering
+static. They looked up.
+
+"Can you hear me, Professor. This is Philip Kramer. I want you to give
+the ship back to us. If you can hear me, release the controls! Let go,
+Professor. Let go!"
+
+Static. A rushing sound, like the wind. They gazed at each other.
+There was silence for a moment.
+
+"It's a waste of time," Gross said.
+
+"No--listen!"
+
+The sputter came again. Then, mixed with the sputter, almost lost in
+it, a voice came, toneless, without inflection, a mechanical, lifeless
+voice from the metal speaker in the wall, above their heads.
+
+"... Is it you, Philip? I can't make you out. Darkness.... Who's
+there? With you...."
+
+"It's me, Kramer." His fingers tightened against the microphone
+handle. "You must release the controls, Professor. We have to get back
+to Terra. You must."
+
+Silence. Then the faint, faltering voice came again, a little stronger
+than before. "Kramer. Everything so strange. I was right, though.
+Consciousness result of thinking. Necessary result. Cognito ergo sum.
+Retain conceptual ability. Can you hear me?"
+
+"Yes, Professor--"
+
+"I altered the wiring. Control. I was fairly certain.... I wonder if I
+can do it. Try...."
+
+Suddenly the air-conditioning snapped into operation. It snapped
+abruptly off again. Down the corridor a door slammed. Something
+thudded. The men stood listening. Sounds came from all sides of them,
+switches shutting, opening. The lights blinked off; they were in
+darkness. The lights came back on, and at the same time the heating
+coils dimmed and faded.
+
+"Good God!" Winter said.
+
+Water poured down on them, the emergency fire-fighting system. There
+was a screaming rush of air. One of the escape hatches had slid back,
+and the air was roaring frantically out into space.
+
+The hatch banged closed. The ship subsided into silence. The heating
+coils glowed into life. As suddenly as it had begun the weird
+exhibition ceased.
+
+"I can do--everything," the dry, toneless voice came from the wall
+speaker. "It is all controlled. Kramer, I wish to talk to you. I've
+been--been thinking. I haven't seen you in many years. A lot to
+discuss. You've changed, boy. We have much to discuss. Your wife--"
+
+The Pilot grabbed Kramer's arm. "There's a ship standing off our bow.
+Look."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They ran to the port. A slender pale craft was moving along with them,
+keeping pace with them. It was signal-blinking.
+
+"A Terran pursuit ship," the Pilot said. "Let's jump. They'll pick us
+up. Suits--"
+
+He ran to a supply cupboard and turned the handle. The door opened and
+he pulled the suits out onto the floor.
+
+"Hurry," Gross said. A panic seized them. They dressed frantically,
+pulling the heavy garments over them. Winter staggered to the escape
+hatch and stood by it, waiting for the others. They joined him, one by
+one.
+
+"Let's go!" Gross said. "Open the hatch."
+
+Winter tugged at the hatch. "Help me."
+
+They grabbed hold, tugging together. Nothing happened. The hatch
+refused to budge.
+
+"Get a crowbar," the Pilot said.
+
+"Hasn't anyone got a blaster?" Gross looked frantically around. "Damn
+it, blast it open!"
+
+"Pull," Kramer grated. "Pull together."
+
+"Are you at the hatch?" the toneless voice came, drifting and eddying
+through the corridors of the ship. They looked up, staring around
+them. "I sense something nearby, outside. A ship? You are leaving, all
+of you? Kramer, you are leaving, too? Very unfortunate. I had hoped we
+could talk. Perhaps at some other time you might be induced to
+remain."
+
+"Open the hatch!" Kramer said, staring up at the impersonal walls of
+the ship. "For God's sake, open it!"
+
+There was silence, an endless pause. Then, very slowly, the hatch slid
+back. The air screamed out, rushing past them into space.
+
+One by one they leaped, one after the other, propelled away by the
+repulsive material of the suits. A few minutes later they were being
+hauled aboard the pursuit ship. As the last one of them was lifted
+through the port, their own ship pointed itself suddenly upward and
+shot off at tremendous speed. It disappeared.
+
+Kramer removed his helmet, gasping. Two sailors held onto him and
+began to wrap him in blankets. Gross sipped a mug of coffee,
+shivering.
+
+"It's gone," Kramer murmured.
+
+"I'll have an alarm sent out," Gross said.
+
+"What's happened to your ship?" a sailor asked curiously. "It sure
+took off in a hurry. Who's on it?"
+
+"We'll have to have it destroyed," Gross went on, his face grim. "It's
+got to be destroyed. There's no telling what it--what _he_ has in
+mind." Gross sat down weakly on a metal bench. "What a close call for
+us. We were so damn trusting."
+
+"What could he be planning," Kramer said, half to himself. "It doesn't
+make sense. I don't get it."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As the ship sped back toward the moon base they sat around the table
+in the dining room, sipping hot coffee and thinking, not saying very
+much.
+
+"Look here," Gross said at last. "What kind of man was Professor
+Thomas? What do you remember about him?"
+
+Kramer put his coffee mug down. "It was ten years ago. I don't
+remember much. It's vague."
+
+He let his mind run back over the years. He and Dolores had been at
+Hunt College together, in physics and the life sciences. The College
+was small and set back away from the momentum of modern life. He had
+gone there because it was his home town, and his father had gone there
+before him.
+
+Professor Thomas had been at the College a long time, as long as
+anyone could remember. He was a strange old man, keeping to himself
+most of the time. There were many things that he disapproved of, but
+he seldom said what they were.
+
+"Do you recall anything that might help us?" Gross asked. "Anything
+that would give us a clue as to what he might have in mind?"
+
+Kramer nodded slowly. "I remember one thing...."
+
+One day he and the Professor had been sitting together in the school
+chapel, talking leisurely.
+
+"Well, you'll be out of school, soon," the Professor had said. "What
+are you going to do?"
+
+"Do? Work at one of the Government Research Projects, I suppose."
+
+"And eventually? What's your ultimate goal?"
+
+Kramer had smiled. "The question is unscientific. It presupposes such
+things as ultimate ends."
+
+"Suppose instead along these lines, then: What if there were no war
+and no Government Research Projects? What would you do, then?"
+
+"I don't know. But how can I imagine a hypothetical situation like
+that? There's been war as long as I can remember. We're geared for
+war. I don't know what I'd do. I suppose I'd adjust, get used to it."
+
+The Professor had stared at him. "Oh, you do think you'd get
+accustomed to it, eh? Well, I'm glad of that. And you think you could
+find something to do?"
+
+Gross listened intently. "What do you infer from this, Kramer?"
+
+"Not much. Except that he was against war."
+
+"We're all against war," Gross pointed out.
+
+"True. But he was withdrawn, set apart. He lived very simply, cooking
+his own meals. His wife died many years ago. He was born in Europe, in
+Italy. He changed his name when he came to the United States. He used
+to read Dante and Milton. He even had a Bible."
+
+"Very anachronistic, don't you think?"
+
+"Yes, he lived quite a lot in the past. He found an old phonograph and
+records, and he listened to the old music. You saw his house, how
+old-fashioned it was."
+
+"Did he have a file?" Winter asked Gross.
+
+"With Security? No, none at all. As far as we could tell he never
+engaged in political work, never joined anything or even seemed to
+have strong political convictions."
+
+"No," Kramer, agreed. "About all he ever did was walk through the
+hills. He liked nature."
+
+"Nature can be of great use to a scientist," Gross said. "There
+wouldn't be any science without it."
+
+"Kramer, what do you think his plan is, taking control of the ship and
+disappearing?" Winter said.
+
+"Maybe the transfer made him insane," the Pilot said. "Maybe there's
+no plan, nothing rational at all."
+
+"But he had the ship rewired, and he had made sure that he would
+retain consciousness and memory before he even agreed to the
+operation. He must have had something planned from the start. But
+what?"
+
+"Perhaps he just wanted to stay alive longer," Kramer said. "He was
+old and about to die. Or--"
+
+"Or what?"
+
+"Nothing." Kramer stood up. "I think as soon as we get to the moon
+base I'll make a vidcall to earth. I want to talk to somebody about
+this."
+
+"Who's that?" Gross asked.
+
+"Dolores. Maybe she remembers something."
+
+"That's a good idea," Gross said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Where are you calling from?" Dolores asked, when he succeeded in
+reaching her.
+
+"From the moon base."
+
+"All kinds of rumors are running around. Why didn't the ship come
+back? What happened?"
+
+"I'm afraid he ran off with it."
+
+"He?"
+
+"The Old Man. Professor Thomas." Kramer explained what had happened.
+
+Dolores listened intently. "How strange. And you think he planned it
+all in advance, from the start?"
+
+"I'm certain. He asked for the plans of construction and the
+theoretical diagrams at once."
+
+"But why? What for?"
+
+"I don't know. Look, Dolores. What do you remember about him? Is there
+anything that might give a clue to all this?"
+
+"Like what?"
+
+"I don't know. That's the trouble."
+
+On the vidscreen Dolores knitted her brow. "I remember he raised
+chickens in his back yard, and once he had a goat." She smiled. "Do
+you remember the day the goat got loose and wandered down the main
+street of town? Nobody could figure out where it came from."
+
+"Anything else?"
+
+"No." He watched her struggling, trying to remember. "He wanted to
+have a farm, sometime, I know."
+
+"All right. Thanks." Kramer touched the switch. "When I get back to
+Terra maybe I'll stop and see you."
+
+"Let me know how it works out."
+
+He cut the line and the picture dimmed and faded. He walked slowly
+back to where Gross and some officers of the Military were sitting at
+a chart table, talking.
+
+"Any luck?" Gross said, looking up.
+
+"No. All she remembers is that he kept a goat."
+
+"Come over and look at this detail chart." Gross motioned him around
+to his side. "Watch!"
+
+Kramer saw the record tabs moving furiously, the little white dots
+racing back and forth.
+
+"What's happening?" he asked.
+
+"A squadron outside the defense zone has finally managed to contact
+the ship. They're maneuvering now, for position. Watch."
+
+The white counters were forming a barrel formation around a black dot
+that was moving steadily across the board, away from the central
+position. As they watched, the white dots constricted around it.
+
+"They're ready to open fire," a technician at the board said.
+"Commander, what shall we tell them to do?"
+
+Gross hesitated. "I hate to be the one who makes the decision. When it
+comes right down to it--"
+
+"It's not just a ship," Kramer said. "It's a man, a living person. A
+human being is up there, moving through space. I wish we knew what--"
+
+"But the order has to be given. We can't take any chances. Suppose he
+went over to them, to the yuks."
+
+Kramer's jaw dropped. "My God, he wouldn't do that."
+
+"Are you sure? Do you know what he'll do?"
+
+"He wouldn't do that."
+
+Gross turned to the technician. "Tell them to go ahead."
+
+"I'm sorry, sir, but now the ship has gotten away. Look down at the
+board."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Gross stared down, Kramer over his shoulder. The black dot had slipped
+through the white dots and had moved off at an abrupt angle. The white
+dots were broken up, dispersing in confusion.
+
+"He's an unusual strategist," one of the officers said. He traced the
+line. "It's an ancient maneuver, an old Prussian device, but it
+worked."
+
+The white dots were turning back. "Too many yuk ships out that far,"
+Gross said. "Well, that's what you get when you don't act quickly." He
+looked up coldly at Kramer. "We should have done it when we had him.
+Look at him go!" He jabbed a finger at the rapidly moving black dot.
+The dot came to the edge of the board and stopped. It had reached the
+limit of the chartered area. "See?"
+
+--Now what? Kramer thought, watching. So the Old Man had escaped the
+cruisers and gotten away. He was alert, all right; there was nothing
+wrong with his mind. Or with his ability to control his new body.
+
+Body--The ship was a new body for him. He had traded in the old dying
+body, withered and frail, for this hulking frame of metal and plastic,
+turbines and rocket jets. He was strong, now. Strong and big. The new
+body was more powerful than a thousand human bodies. But how long
+would it last him? The average life of a cruiser was only ten years.
+With careful handling he might get twenty out of it, before some
+essential part failed and there was no way to replace it.
+
+And then, what then? What would he do, when something failed and there
+was no one to fix it for him? That would be the end. Someplace, far
+out in the cold darkness of space, the ship would slow down, silent
+and lifeless, to exhaust its last heat into the eternal timelessness
+of outer space. Or perhaps it would crash on some barren asteroid,
+burst into a million fragments.
+
+It was only a question of time.
+
+"Your wife didn't remember anything?" Gross said.
+
+"I told you. Only that he kept a goat, once."
+
+"A hell of a lot of help that is."
+
+Kramer shrugged. "It's not my fault."
+
+"I wonder if we'll ever see him again." Gross stared down at the
+indicator dot, still hanging at the edge of the board. "I wonder if
+he'll ever move back this way."
+
+"I wonder, too," Kramer said.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That night Kramer lay in bed, tossing from side to side, unable to
+sleep. The moon gravity, even artificially increased, was unfamiliar
+to him and it made him uncomfortable. A thousand thoughts wandered
+loose in his head as he lay, fully awake.
+
+What did it all mean? What was the Professor's plan? Maybe they would
+never know. Maybe the ship was gone for good; the Old Man had left
+forever, shooting into outer space. They might never find out why he
+had done it, what purpose--if any--had been in his mind.
+
+Kramer sat up in bed. He turned on the light and lit a cigarette. His
+quarters were small, a metal-lined bunk room, part of the moon station
+base.
+
+The Old Man had wanted to talk to him. He had wanted to discuss
+things, hold a conversation, but in the hysteria and confusion all
+they had been able to think of was getting away. The ship was rushing
+off with them, carrying them into outer space. Kramer set his jaw.
+Could they be blamed for jumping? They had no idea where they were
+being taken, or why. They were helpless, caught in their own ship, and
+the pursuit ship standing by waiting to pick them up was their only
+chance. Another half hour and it would have been too late.
+
+But what had the Old Man wanted to say? What had he intended to tell
+him, in those first confusing moments when the ship around them had
+come alive, each metal strut and wire suddenly animate, the body of a
+living creature, a vast metal organism?
+
+It was weird, unnerving. He could not forget it, even now. He looked
+around the small room uneasily. What did it signify, the coming to
+life of metal and plastic? All at once they had found themselves
+inside a _living_ creature, in its stomach, like Jonah inside the
+whale.
+
+It had been alive, and it had talked to them, talked calmly and
+rationally, as it rushed them off, faster and faster into outer space.
+The wall speaker and circuit had become the vocal cords and mouth, the
+wiring the spinal cord and nerves, the hatches and relays and circuit
+breakers the muscles.
+
+They had been helpless, completely helpless. The ship had, in a brief
+second, stolen their power away from them and left them defenseless,
+practically at its mercy. It was not right; it made him uneasy. All
+his life he had controlled machines, bent nature and the forces of
+nature to man and man's needs. The human race had slowly evolved until
+it was in a position to operate things, run them as it saw fit. Now
+all at once it had been plunged back down the ladder again, prostrate
+before a Power against which they were children.
+
+Kramer got out of bed. He put on his bathrobe and began to search for
+a cigarette. While he was searching, the vidphone rang.
+
+He snapped the vidphone on.
+
+"Yes?"
+
+The face of the immediate monitor appeared. "A call from Terra, Mr.
+Kramer. An emergency call."
+
+"Emergency call? For me? Put it through." Kramer came awake, brushing
+his hair back out of his eyes. Alarm plucked at him.
+
+From the speaker a strange voice came. "Philip Kramer? Is this
+Kramer?"
+
+"Yes. Go on."
+
+"This is General Hospital, New York City, Terra. Mr. Kramer, your wife
+is here. She has been critically injured in an accident. Your name was
+given to us to call. Is it possible for you to--"
+
+"How badly?" Kramer gripped the vidphone stand. "Is it serious?"
+
+"Yes, it's serious, Mr. Kramer. Are you able to come here? The quicker
+you can come the better."
+
+"Yes." Kramer nodded. "I'll come. Thanks."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The screen died as the connection was broken. Kramer waited a moment.
+Then he tapped the button. The screen relit again. "Yes, sir," the
+monitor said.
+
+"Can I get a ship to Terra at once? It's an emergency. My wife--"
+
+"There's no ship leaving the moon for eight hours. You'll have to wait
+until the next period."
+
+"Isn't there anything I can do?"
+
+"We can broadcast a general request to all ships passing through this
+area. Sometimes cruisers pass by here returning to Terra for repairs."
+
+"Will you broadcast that for me? I'll come down to the field."
+
+"Yes sir. But there may be no ship in the area for awhile. It's a
+gamble." The screen died.
+
+Kramer dressed quickly. He put on his coat and hurried to the lift. A
+moment later he was running across the general receiving lobby, past
+the rows of vacant desks and conference tables. At the door the
+sentries stepped aside and he went outside, onto the great concrete
+steps.
+
+The face of the moon was in shadow. Below him the field stretched out
+in total darkness, a black void, endless, without form. He made his
+way carefully down the steps and along the ramp along the side of the
+field, to the control tower. A faint row of red lights showed him the
+way.
+
+Two soldiers challenged him at the foot of the tower, standing in the
+shadows, their guns ready.
+
+"Kramer?"
+
+"Yes." A light was flashed in his face.
+
+"Your call has been sent out already."
+
+"Any luck?" Kramer asked.
+
+"There's a cruiser nearby that has made contact with us. It has an
+injured jet and is moving slowly back toward Terra, away from the
+line."
+
+"Good." Kramer nodded, a flood of relief rushing through him. He lit a
+cigarette and gave one to each of the soldiers. The soldiers lit up.
+
+"Sir," one of them asked, "is it true about the experimental ship?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"It came to life and ran off?"
+
+"No, not exactly," Kramer said. "It had a new type of control system
+instead of the Johnson units. It wasn't properly tested."
+
+"But sir, one of the cruisers that was there got up close to it, and a
+buddy of mine says this ship acted funny. He never saw anything like
+it. It was like when he was fishing once on Terra, in Washington
+State, fishing for bass. The fish were smart, going this way and
+that--"
+
+"Here's your cruiser," the other soldier said. "Look!"
+
+An enormous vague shape was setting slowly down onto the field. They
+could make nothing out but its row of tiny green blinkers. Kramer
+stared at the shape.
+
+"Better hurry, sir," the soldiers said. "They don't stick around here
+very long."
+
+"Thanks." Kramer loped across the field, toward the black shape that
+rose up above him, extended across the width of the field. The ramp
+was down from the side of the cruiser and he caught hold of it. The
+ramp rose, and a moment later Kramer was inside the hold of the ship.
+The hatch slid shut behind him.
+
+As he made his way up the stairs to the main deck the turbines roared
+up from the moon, out into space.
+
+Kramer opened the door to the main deck. He stopped suddenly, staring
+around him in surprise. There was nobody in sight. The ship was
+deserted.
+
+"Good God," he said. Realization swept over him, numbing him. He sat
+down on a bench, his head swimming. "Good God."
+
+The ship roared out into space leaving the moon and Terra farther
+behind each moment.
+
+And there was nothing he could do.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"So it was you who put the call through," he said at last. "It was you
+who called me on the vidphone, not any hospital on Terra. It was all
+part of the plan." He looked up and around him. "And Dolores is
+really--"
+
+"Your wife is fine," the wall speaker above him said tonelessly. "It
+was a fraud. I am sorry to trick you that way, Philip, but it was all
+I could think of. Another day and you would have been back on Terra. I
+don't want to remain in this area any longer than necessary. They have
+been so certain of finding me out in deep space that I have been able
+to stay here without too much danger. But even the purloined letter
+was found eventually."
+
+Kramer smoked his cigarette nervously. "What are you going to do?
+Where are we going?"
+
+"First, I want to talk to you. I have many things to discuss. I was
+very disappointed when you left me, along with the others. I had hoped
+that you would remain." The dry voice chuckled. "Remember how we used
+to talk in the old days, you and I? That was a long time ago."
+
+The ship was gaining speed. It plunged through space at tremendous
+speed, rushing through the last of the defense zone and out beyond. A
+rush of nausea made Kramer bend over for a moment.
+
+When he straightened up the voice from the wall went on, "I'm sorry to
+step it up so quickly, but we are still in danger. Another few moments
+and we'll be free."
+
+"How about yuk ships? Aren't they out here?"
+
+"I've already slipped away from several of them. They're quite curious
+about me."
+
+"Curious?"
+
+"They sense that I'm different, more like their own organic mines.
+They don't like it. I believe they will begin to withdraw from this
+area, soon. Apparently they don't want to get involved with me.
+They're an odd race, Philip. I would have liked to study them closely,
+try to learn something about them. I'm of the opinion that they use no
+inert material. All their equipment and instruments are alive, in some
+form or other. They don't construct or build at all. The idea of
+_making_ is foreign to them. They utilize existing forms. Even their
+ships--"
+
+"Where are we going?" Kramer said. "I want to know where you are
+taking me."
+
+"Frankly, I'm not certain."
+
+"You're not certain?"
+
+"I haven't worked some details out. There are a few vague spots in my
+program, still. But I think that in a short while I'll have them
+ironed out."
+
+"What is your program?" Kramer said.
+
+"It's really very simple. But don't you want to come into the control
+room and sit? The seats are much more comfortable than that metal
+bench."
+
+Kramer went into the control room and sat down at the control board.
+Looking at the useless apparatus made him feel strange.
+
+"What's the matter?" the speaker above the board rasped.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kramer gestured helplessly. "I'm--powerless. I can't do anything. And
+I don't like it. Do you blame me?"
+
+"No. No, I don't blame you. But you'll get your control back, soon.
+Don't worry. This is only a temporary expedient, taking you off this
+way. It was something I didn't contemplate. I forgot that orders would
+be given out to shoot me on sight."
+
+"It was Gross' idea."
+
+"I don't doubt that. My conception, my plan, came to me as soon as you
+began to describe your project, that day at my house. I saw at once
+that you were wrong; you people have no understanding of the mind at
+all. I realized that the transfer of a human brain from an organic
+body to a complex artificial space ship would not involve the loss of
+the intellectualization faculty of the mind. When a man thinks, he
+_is_.
+
+"When I realized that, I saw the possibility of an age-old dream
+becoming real. I was quite elderly when I first met you, Philip. Even
+then my life-span had come pretty much to its end. I could look ahead
+to nothing but death, and with it the extinction of all my ideas. I
+had made no mark on the world, none at all. My students, one by one,
+passed from me into the world, to take up jobs in the great Research
+Project, the search for better and bigger weapons of war.
+
+"The world has been fighting for a long time, first with itself, then
+with the Martians, then with these beings from Proxima Centauri, whom
+we know nothing about. The human society has evolved war as a cultural
+institution, like the science of astronomy, or mathematics. War is a
+part of our lives, a career, a respected vocation. Bright, alert young
+men and women move into it, putting their shoulders to the wheel as
+they did in the time of Nebuchadnezzar. It has always been so.
+
+"But is it innate in mankind? I don't think so. No social custom is
+innate. There were many human groups that did not go to war; the
+Eskimos never grasped the idea at all, and the American Indians never
+took to it well.
+
+"But these dissenters were wiped out, and a cultural pattern was
+established that became the standard for the whole planet. Now it has
+become ingrained in us.
+
+"But if someplace along the line some other way of settling problems
+had arisen and taken hold, something different than the massing of men
+and material to--"
+
+"What's your plan?" Kramer said. "I know the theory. It was part of
+one of your lectures."
+
+"Yes, buried in a lecture on plant selection, as I recall. When you
+came to me with this proposition I realized that perhaps my conception
+could be brought to life, after all. If my theory were right that war
+is only a habit, not an instinct, a society built up apart from Terra
+with a minimum of cultural roots might develop differently. If it
+failed to absorb our outlook, if it could start out on another foot,
+it might not arrive at the same point to which we have come: a dead
+end, with nothing but greater and greater wars in sight, until nothing
+is left but ruin and destruction everywhere.
+
+"Of course, there would have to be a Watcher to guide the experiment,
+at first. A crisis would undoubtedly come very quickly, probably in
+the second generation. Cain would arise almost at once.
+
+"You see, Kramer, I estimate that if I remain at rest most of the
+time, on some small planet or moon, I may be able to keep functioning
+for almost a hundred years. That would be time enough, sufficient to
+see the direction of the new colony. After that--Well, after that it
+would be up to the colony itself.
+
+"Which is just as well, of course. Man must take control eventually,
+on his own. One hundred years, and after that they will have control
+of their own destiny. Perhaps I am wrong, perhaps war is more than a
+habit. Perhaps it is a law of the universe, that things can only
+survive as groups by group violence.
+
+"But I'm going ahead and taking the chance that it is only a habit,
+that I'm right, that war is something we're so accustomed to that we
+don't realize it is a very unnatural thing. Now as to the place! I'm
+still a little vague about that. We must find the place, still.
+
+"That's what we're doing now. You and I are going to inspect a few
+systems off the beaten path, planets where the trading prospects are
+low enough to keep Terran ships away. I know of one planet that might
+be a good place. It was reported by the Fairchild Expedition in their
+original manual. We may look into that, for a start."
+
+The ship was silent.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Kramer sat for a time, staring down at the metal floor under him. The
+floor throbbed dully with the motion of the turbines. At last he
+looked up.
+
+"You might be right. Maybe our outlook is only a habit." Kramer got to
+his feet. "But I wonder if something has occurred to you?"
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"If it's such a deeply ingrained habit, going back thousands of years,
+how are you going to get your colonists to make the break, leave Terra
+and Terran customs? How about _this_ generation, the first ones, the
+people who found the colony? I think you're right that the next
+generation would be free of all this, if there were an--" He grinned.
+"--An Old Man Above to teach them something else instead."
+
+Kramer looked up at the wall speaker. "How are you going to get the
+people to leave Terra and come with you, if by your own theory, this
+generation can't be saved, it all has to start with the next?"
+
+The wall speaker was silent. Then it made a sound, the faint dry
+chuckle.
+
+"I'm surprised at you, Philip. Settlers can be found. We won't need
+many, just a few." The speaker chuckled again. "I'll acquaint you with
+my solution."
+
+At the far end of the corridor a door slid open. There was sound, a
+hesitant sound. Kramer turned.
+
+"Dolores!"
+
+Dolores Kramer stood uncertainly, looking into the control room. She
+blinked in amazement. "Phil! What are you doing here? What's going
+on?"
+
+They stared at each other.
+
+"What's happening?" Dolores said. "I received a vidcall that you had
+been hurt in a lunar explosion--"
+
+The wall speaker rasped into life. "You see, Philip, that problem is
+already solved. We don't really need so many people; even a single
+couple might do."
+
+Kramer nodded slowly. "I see," he murmured thickly. "Just one couple.
+One man and woman."
+
+"They might make it all right, if there were someone to watch and see
+that things went as they should. There will be quite a few things I
+can help you with, Philip. Quite a few. We'll get along very well, I
+think."
+
+Kramer grinned wryly. "You could even help us name the animals," he
+said. "I understand that's the first step."
+
+"I'll be glad to," the toneless, impersonal voice said. "As I recall,
+my part will be to bring them to you, one by one. Then you can do the
+actual naming."
+
+"I don't understand," Dolores faltered. "What does he mean, Phil?
+Naming animals. What kind of animals? Where are we going?"
+
+Kramer walked slowly over to the port and stood staring silently out,
+his arms folded. Beyond the ship a myriad fragments of light gleamed,
+countless coals glowing in the dark void. Stars, suns, systems.
+Endless, without number. A universe of worlds. An infinity of planets,
+waiting for them, gleaming and winking from the darkness.
+
+He turned back, away from the port. "Where are we going?" He smiled at
+his wife, standing nervous and frightened, her large eyes full of
+alarm. "I don't know where we are going," he said. "But somehow that
+doesn't seem too important right now.... I'm beginning to see the
+Professor's point, it's the result that counts."
+
+And for the first time in many months he put his arm around Dolores.
+At first she stiffened, the fright and nervousness still in her eyes.
+But then suddenly she relaxed against him and there were tears wetting
+her cheeks.
+
+"Phil ... do you really think we can start over again--you and I?"
+
+He kissed her tenderly, then passionately.
+
+And the spaceship shot swiftly through the endless, trackless eternity
+of the void....
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/data/pg41562.txt

+    Ed had always been a practical man, when he saw something was wrong
+    he tried to correct it. Then one day he saw _it_ hanging in the town
+    square.
+
+
+Five o'clock Ed Loyce washed up, tossed on his hat and coat, got his car
+out and headed across town toward his TV sales store. He was tired. His
+back and shoulders ached from digging dirt out of the basement and
+wheeling it into the back yard. But for a forty-year-old man he had done
+okay. Janet could get a new vase with the money he had saved; and he
+liked the idea of repairing the foundations himself!
+
+It was getting dark. The setting sun cast long rays over the scurrying
+commuters, tired and grim-faced, women loaded down with bundles and
+packages, students swarming home from the university, mixing with clerks
+and businessmen and drab secretaries. He stopped his Packard for a red
+light and then started it up again. The store had been open without him;
+he'd arrive just in time to spell the help for dinner, go over the
+records of the day, maybe even close a couple of sales himself. He drove
+slowly past the small square of green in the center of the street, the
+town park. There were no parking places in front of LOYCE TV SALES AND
+SERVICE. He cursed under his breath and swung the car in a U-turn. Again
+he passed the little square of green with its lonely drinking fountain
+and bench and single lamppost.
+
+From the lamppost something was hanging. A shapeless dark bundle,
+swinging a little with the wind. Like a dummy of some sort. Loyce rolled
+down his window and peered out. What the hell was it? A display of
+some kind? Sometimes the Chamber of Commerce put up displays in the
+square.
+
+Again he made a U-turn and brought his car around. He passed the park
+and concentrated on the dark bundle. It wasn't a dummy. And if it was a
+display it was a strange kind. The hackles on his neck rose and he
+swallowed uneasily. Sweat slid out on his face and hands.
+
+It was a body. A human body.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Look at it!" Loyce snapped. "Come on out here!"
+
+Don Fergusson came slowly out of the store, buttoning his pin-stripe
+coat with dignity. "This is a big deal, Ed. I can't just leave the guy
+standing there."
+
+"See it?" Ed pointed into the gathering gloom. The lamppost jutted up
+against the sky--the post and the bundle swinging from it. "There it is.
+How the hell long has it been there?" His voice rose excitedly. "What's
+wrong with everybody? They just walk on past!"
+
+Don Fergusson lit a cigarette slowly. "Take it easy, old man. There must
+be a good reason, or it wouldn't be there."
+
+"A reason! What kind of a reason?"
+
+Fergusson shrugged. "Like the time the Traffic Safety Council put that
+wrecked Buick there. Some sort of civic thing. How would I know?"
+
+Jack Potter from the shoe shop joined them. "What's up, boys?"
+
+"There's a body hanging from the lamppost," Loyce said. "I'm going to
+call the cops."
+
+"They must know about it," Potter said. "Or otherwise it wouldn't be
+there."
+
+"I got to get back in." Fergusson headed back into the store. "Business
+before pleasure."
+
+Loyce began to get hysterical. "You see it? You see it hanging there? A
+man's body! A dead man!"
+
+"Sure, Ed. I saw it this afternoon when I went out for coffee."
+
+"You mean it's been there all afternoon?"
+
+"Sure. What's the matter?" Potter glanced at his watch. "Have to run.
+See you later, Ed."
+
+Potter hurried off, joining the flow of people moving along the
+sidewalk. Men and women, passing by the park. A few glanced up curiously
+at the dark bundle--and then went on. Nobody stopped. Nobody paid any
+attention.
+
+"I'm going nuts," Loyce whispered. He made his way to the curb and
+crossed out into traffic, among the cars. Horns honked angrily at him.
+He gained the curb and stepped up onto the little square of green.
+
+The man had been middle-aged. His clothing was ripped and torn, a gray
+suit, splashed and caked with dried mud. A stranger. Loyce had never
+seen him before. Not a local man. His face was partly turned, away, and
+in the evening wind he spun a little, turning gently, silently. His skin
+was gouged and cut. Red gashes, deep scratches of congealed blood. A
+pair of steel-rimmed glasses hung from one ear, dangling foolishly. His
+eyes bulged. His mouth was open, tongue thick and ugly blue.
+
+"For Heaven's sake," Loyce muttered, sickened. He pushed down his nausea
+and made his way back to the sidewalk. He was shaking all over, with
+revulsion--and fear.
+
+_Why?_ Who was the man? Why was he hanging there? What did it mean?
+
+And--why didn't anybody notice?
+
+He bumped into a small man hurrying along the sidewalk. "Watch it!" the
+man grated, "Oh, it's you, Ed."
+
+Ed nodded dazedly. "Hello, Jenkins."
+
+"What's the matter?" The stationery clerk caught Ed's arm. "You look
+sick."
+
+"The body. There in the park."
+
+"Sure, Ed." Jenkins led him into the alcove of LOYCE TV SALES AND
+SERVICE. "Take it easy."
+
+Margaret Henderson from the jewelry store joined them. "Something
+wrong?"
+
+"Ed's not feeling well."
+
+Loyce yanked himself free. "How can you stand here? Don't you see it?
+For God's sake--"
+
+"What's he talking about?" Margaret asked nervously.
+
+"The body!" Ed shouted. "The body hanging there!"
+
+More people collected. "Is he sick? It's Ed Loyce. You okay, Ed?"
+
+"The body!" Loyce screamed, struggling to get past them. Hands caught at
+him. He tore loose. "Let me go! The police! Get the police!"
+
+"Ed--"
+
+"Better get a doctor!"
+
+"He must be sick."
+
+"Or drunk."
+
+Loyce fought his way through the people. He stumbled and half fell.
+Through a blur he saw rows of faces, curious, concerned, anxious. Men
+and women halting to see what the disturbance was. He fought past them
+toward his store. He could see Fergusson inside talking to a man,
+showing him an Emerson TV set. Pete Foley in the back at the service
+counter, setting up a new Philco. Loyce shouted at them frantically.
+His voice was lost in the roar of traffic and the murmur around him.
+
+"Do something!" he screamed. "Don't stand there! Do something!
+Something's wrong! Something's happened! Things are going on!"
+
+The crowd melted respectfully for the two heavy-set cops moving
+efficiently toward Loyce.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Name?" the cop with the notebook murmured.
+
+"Loyce." He mopped his forehead wearily. "Edward C. Loyce. Listen to me.
+Back there--"
+
+"Address?" the cop demanded. The police car moved swiftly through
+traffic, shooting among the cars and buses. Loyce sagged against the
+seat, exhausted and confused. He took a deep shuddering breath.
+
+"1368 Hurst Road."
+
+"That's here in Pikeville?"
+
+"That's right." Loyce pulled himself up with a violent effort. "Listen
+to me. Back there. In the square. Hanging from the lamppost--"
+
+"Where were you today?" the cop behind the wheel demanded.
+
+"Where?" Loyce echoed.
+
+"You weren't in your shop, were you?"
+
+"No." He shook his head. "No, I was home. Down in the basement."
+
+"In the _basement_?"
+
+"Digging. A new foundation. Getting out the dirt to pour a cement frame.
+Why? What has that to do with--"
+
+"Was anybody else down there with you?"
+
+"No. My wife was downtown. My kids were at school." Loyce looked from
+one heavy-set cop to the other. Hope flicked across his face, wild hope.
+"You mean because I was down there I missed--the explanation? I didn't
+get in on it? Like everybody else?"
+
+After a pause the cop with the notebook said: "That's right. You missed
+the explanation."
+
+"Then it's official? The body--it's _supposed_ to be hanging there?"
+
+"It's supposed to be hanging there. For everybody to see."
+
+Ed Loyce grinned weakly. "Good Lord. I guess I sort of went off the deep
+end. I thought maybe something had happened. You know, something like
+the Ku Klux Klan. Some kind of violence. Communists or Fascists taking
+over." He wiped his face with his breast-pocket handkerchief, his hands
+shaking. "I'm glad to know it's on the level."
+
+"It's on the level." The police car was getting near the Hall of
+Justice. The sun had set. The streets were gloomy and dark. The lights
+had not yet come on.
+
+"I feel better," Loyce said. "I was pretty excited there, for a minute.
+I guess I got all stirred up. Now that I understand, there's no need to
+take me in, is there?"
+
+The two cops said nothing.
+
+"I should be back at my store. The boys haven't had dinner. I'm all
+right, now. No more trouble. Is there any need of--"
+
+"This won't take long," the cop behind the wheel interrupted. "A short
+process. Only a few minutes."
+
+"I hope it's short," Loyce muttered. The car slowed down for a
+stoplight. "I guess I sort of disturbed the peace. Funny, getting
+excited like that and--"
+
+Loyce yanked the door open. He sprawled out into the street and rolled
+to his feet. Cars were moving all around him, gaining speed as the light
+changed. Loyce leaped onto the curb and raced among the people,
+burrowing into the swarming crowds. Behind him he heard sounds, shouts,
+people running.
+
+They weren't cops. He had realized that right away. He knew every cop in
+Pikeville. A man couldn't own a store, operate a business in a small
+town for twenty-five years without getting to know all the cops.
+
+They weren't cops--and there hadn't been any explanation. Potter,
+Fergusson, Jenkins, none of them knew why it was there. They didn't
+know--and they didn't care. _That_ was the strange part.
+
+Loyce ducked into a hardware store. He raced toward the back, past the
+startled clerks and customers, into the shipping room and through the
+back door. He tripped over a garbage can and ran up a flight of concrete
+steps. He climbed over a fence and jumped down on the other side,
+gasping and panting.
+
+There was no sound behind him. He had got away.
+
+He was at the entrance of an alley, dark and strewn with boards and
+ruined boxes and tires. He could see the street at the far end. A street
+light wavered and came on. Men and women. Stores. Neon signs. Cars.
+
+And to his right--the police station.
+
+He was close, terribly close. Past the loading platform of a grocery
+store rose the white concrete side of the Hall of Justice. Barred
+windows. The police antenna. A great concrete wall rising up in the
+darkness. A bad place for him to be near. He was too close. He had to
+keep moving, get farther away from them.
+
+_Them?_
+
+Loyce moved cautiously down the alley. Beyond the police station was the
+City Hall, the old-fashioned yellow structure of wood and gilded brass
+and broad cement steps. He could see the endless rows of offices, dark
+windows, the cedars and beds of flowers on each side of the entrance.
+
+And--something else.
+
+Above the City Hall was a patch of darkness, a cone of gloom denser than
+the surrounding night. A prism of black that spread out and was lost
+into the sky.
+
+He listened. Good God, he could hear something. Something that made him
+struggle frantically to close his ears, his mind, to shut out the sound.
+A buzzing. A distant, muted hum like a great swarm of bees.
+
+Loyce gazed up, rigid with horror. The splotch of darkness, hanging over
+the City Hall. Darkness so thick it seemed almost solid. _In the vortex
+something moved._ Flickering shapes. Things, descending from the sky,
+pausing momentarily above the City Hall, fluttering over it in a dense
+swarm and then dropping silently onto the roof.
+
+Shapes. Fluttering shapes from the sky. From the crack of darkness that
+hung above him.
+
+He was seeing--them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a long time Loyce watched, crouched behind a sagging fence in a pool
+of scummy water.
+
+They were landing. Coming down in groups, landing on the roof of the
+City Hall and disappearing inside. They had wings. Like giant insects of
+some kind. They flew and fluttered and came to rest--and then crawled
+crab-fashion, sideways, across the roof and into the building.
+
+He was sickened. And fascinated. Cold night wind blew around him and he
+shuddered. He was tired, dazed with shock. On the front steps of the
+City Hall were men, standing here and there. Groups of men coming out of
+the building and halting for a moment before going on.
+
+Were there more of them?
+
+It didn't seem possible. What he saw descending from the black chasm
+weren't men. They were alien--from some other world, some other
+dimension. Sliding through this slit, this break in the shell of the
+universe. Entering through this gap, winged insects from another realm
+of being.
+
+On the steps of the City Hall a group of men broke up. A few moved
+toward a waiting car. One of the remaining shapes started to re-enter
+the City Hall. It changed its mind and turned to follow the others.
+
+Loyce closed his eyes in horror. His senses reeled. He hung on tight,
+clutching at the sagging fence. The shape, the man-shape, had abruptly
+fluttered up and flapped after the others. It flew to the sidewalk and
+came to rest among them.
+
+Pseudo-men. Imitation men. Insects with ability to disguise themselves
+as men. Like other insects familiar to Earth. Protective coloration.
+Mimicry.
+
+Loyce pulled himself away. He got slowly to his feet. It was night. The
+alley was totally dark. But maybe they could see in the dark. Maybe
+darkness made no difference to them.
+
+He left the alley cautiously and moved out onto the street. Men and
+women flowed past, but not so many, now. At the bus-stops stood waiting
+groups. A huge bus lumbered along the street, its lights flashing in the
+evening gloom.
+
+Loyce moved forward. He pushed his way among those waiting and when the
+bus halted he boarded it and took a seat in the rear, by the door. A
+moment later the bus moved into life and rumbled down the street.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Loyce relaxed a little. He studied the people around him. Dulled, tired
+faces. People going home from work. Quite ordinary faces. None of them
+paid any attention to him. All sat quietly, sunk down in their seats,
+jiggling with the motion of the bus.
+
+The man sitting next to him unfolded a newspaper. He began to read the
+sports section, his lips moving. An ordinary man. Blue suit. Tie. A
+businessman, or a salesman. On his way home to his wife and family.
+
+Across the aisle a young woman, perhaps twenty. Dark eyes and hair, a
+package on her lap. Nylons and heels. Red coat and white angora sweater.
+Gazing absently ahead of her.
+
+A high school boy in jeans and black jacket.
+
+A great triple-chinned woman with an immense shopping bag loaded with
+packages and parcels. Her thick face dim with weariness.
+
+Ordinary people. The kind that rode the bus every evening. Going home to
+their families. To dinner.
+
+Going home--with their minds dead. Controlled, filmed over with the mask
+of an alien being that had appeared and taken possession of them, their
+town, their lives. Himself, too. Except that he happened to be deep in
+his cellar instead of in the store. Somehow, he had been overlooked.
+They had missed him. Their control wasn't perfect, foolproof.
+
+Maybe there were others.
+
+Hope flickered in Loyce. They weren't omnipotent. They had made a
+mistake, not got control of him. Their net, their field of control, had
+passed over him. He had emerged from his cellar as he had gone down.
+Apparently their power-zone was limited.
+
+A few seats down the aisle a man was watching him. Loyce broke off his
+chain of thought. A slender man, with dark hair and a small mustache.
+Well-dressed, brown suit and shiny shoes. A book between his small
+hands. He was watching Loyce, studying him intently. He turned quickly
+away.
+
+Loyce tensed. One of _them_? Or--another they had missed?
+
+The man was watching him again. Small dark eyes, alive and clever.
+Shrewd. A man too shrewd for them--or one of the things itself, an alien
+insect from beyond.
+
+The bus halted. An elderly man got on slowly and dropped his token into
+the box. He moved down the aisle and took a seat opposite Loyce.
+
+The elderly man caught the sharp-eyed man's gaze. For a split second
+something passed between them.
+
+A look rich with meaning.
+
+Loyce got to his feet. The bus was moving. He ran to the door. One step
+down into the well. He yanked the emergency door release. The rubber
+door swung open.
+
+"Hey!" the driver shouted, jamming on the brakes. "What the hell--"
+
+Loyce squirmed through. The bus was slowing down. Houses on all sides. A
+residential district, lawns and tall apartment buildings. Behind him,
+the bright-eyed man had leaped up. The elderly man was also on his feet.
+They were coming after him.
+
+Loyce leaped. He hit the pavement with terrific force and rolled against
+the curb. Pain lapped over him. Pain and a vast tide of blackness.
+Desperately, he fought it off. He struggled to his knees and then slid
+down again. The bus had stopped. People were getting off.
+
+Loyce groped around. His fingers closed over something. A rock, lying in
+the gutter. He crawled to his feet, grunting with pain. A shape loomed
+before him. A man, the bright-eyed man with the book.
+
+Loyce kicked. The man gasped and fell. Loyce brought the rock down. The
+man screamed and tried to roll away. "_Stop!_ For God's sake listen--"
+
+He struck again. A hideous crunching sound. The man's voice cut off and
+dissolved in a bubbling wail. Loyce scrambled up and back. The others
+were there, now. All around him. He ran, awkwardly, down the sidewalk,
+up a driveway. None of them followed him. They had stopped and were
+bending over the inert body of the man with the book, the bright-eyed
+man who had come after him.
+
+Had he made a mistake?
+
+But it was too late to worry about that. He had to get out--away from
+them. Out of Pikeville, beyond the crack of darkness, the rent between
+their world and his.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Ed!" Janet Loyce backed away nervously. "What is it? What--"
+
+Ed Loyce slammed the door behind him and came into the living room.
+"Pull down the shades. Quick."
+
+Janet moved toward the window. "But--"
+
+"Do as I say. Who else is here besides you?"
+
+"Nobody. Just the twins. They're upstairs in their room. What's
+happened? You look so strange. Why are you home?"
+
+Ed locked the front door. He prowled around the house, into the kitchen.
+From the drawer under the sink he slid out the big butcher knife and ran
+his finger along it. Sharp. Plenty sharp. He returned to the living
+room.
+
+"Listen to me," he said. "I don't have much time. They know I escaped
+and they'll be looking for me."
+
+"Escaped?" Janet's face twisted with bewilderment and fear. "Who?"
+
+"The town has been taken over. They're in control. I've got it pretty
+well figured out. They started at the top, at the City Hall and police
+department. What they did with the _real_ humans they--"
+
+"What are you talking about?"
+
+"We've been invaded. From some other universe, some other dimension.
+They're insects. Mimicry. And more. Power to control minds. Your mind."
+
+"My mind?"
+
+"Their entrance is _here_, in Pikeville. They've taken over all of you.
+The whole town--except me. We're up against an incredibly powerful
+enemy, but they have their limitations. That's our hope. They're
+limited! They can make mistakes!"
+
+Janet shook her head. "I don't understand, Ed. You must be insane."
+
+"Insane? No. Just lucky. If I hadn't been down in the basement I'd be
+like all the rest of you." Loyce peered out the window. "But I can't
+stand here talking. Get your coat."
+
+"My coat?"
+
+"We're getting out of here. Out of Pikeville. We've got to get help.
+Fight this thing. They _can_ be beaten. They're not infallible. It's
+going to be close--but we may make it if we hurry. Come on!" He grabbed
+her arm roughly. "Get your coat and call the twins. We're all leaving.
+Don't stop to pack. There's no time for that."
+
+White-faced, his wife moved toward the closet and got down her coat.
+"Where are we going?"
+
+Ed pulled open the desk drawer and spilled the contents out onto the
+floor. He grabbed up a road map and spread it open. "They'll have the
+highway covered, of course. But there's a back road. To Oak Grove. I got
+onto it once. It's practically abandoned. Maybe they'll forget about
+it."
+
+"The old Ranch Road? Good Lord--it's completely closed. Nobody's
+supposed to drive over it."
+
+"I know." Ed thrust the map grimly into his coat. "That's our best
+chance. Now call down the twins and let's get going. Your car is full of
+gas, isn't it?"
+
+Janet was dazed.
+
+"The Chevy? I had it filled up yesterday afternoon." Janet moved toward
+the stairs. "Ed, I--"
+
+"Call the twins!" Ed unlocked the front door and peered out. Nothing
+stirred. No sign of life. All right so far.
+
+"Come on downstairs," Janet called in a wavering voice. "We're--going
+out for awhile."
+
+"Now?" Tommy's voice came.
+
+"Hurry up," Ed barked. "Get down here, both of you."
+
+Tommy appeared at the top of the stairs. "I was doing my home work.
+We're starting fractions. Miss Parker says if we don't get this done--"
+
+"You can forget about fractions." Ed grabbed his son as he came down the
+stairs and propelled him toward the door. "Where's Jim?"
+
+"He's coming."
+
+Jim started slowly down the stairs. "What's up, Dad?"
+
+"We're going for a ride."
+
+"A ride? Where?"
+
+Ed turned to Janet. "We'll leave the lights on. And the TV set. Go turn
+it on." He pushed her toward the set. "So they'll think we're still--"
+
+He heard the buzz. And dropped instantly, the long butcher knife out.
+Sickened, he saw it coming down the stairs at him, wings a blur of
+motion as it aimed itself. It still bore a vague resemblance to Jimmy.
+It was small, a baby one. A brief glimpse--the thing hurtling at him,
+cold, multi-lensed inhuman eyes. Wings, body still clothed in yellow
+T-shirt and jeans, the mimic outline still stamped on it. A strange
+half-turn of its body as it reached him. What was it doing?
+
+A stinger.
+
+Loyce stabbed wildly at it. It retreated, buzzing frantically. Loyce
+rolled and crawled toward the door. Tommy and Janet stood still as
+statues, faces blank. Watching without expression. Loyce stabbed again.
+This time the knife connected. The thing shrieked and faltered. It
+bounced against the wall and fluttered down.
+
+Something lapped through his mind. A wall of force, energy, an alien
+mind probing into him. He was suddenly paralyzed. The mind entered his
+own, touched against him briefly, shockingly. An utterly alien presence,
+settling over him--and then it flickered out as the thing collapsed in a
+broken heap on the rug.
+
+It was dead. He turned it over with his foot. It was an insect, a fly of
+some kind. Yellow T-shirt, jeans. His son Jimmy.... He closed his mind
+tight. It was too late to think about that. Savagely he scooped up his
+knife and headed toward the door. Janet and Tommy stood stone-still,
+neither of them moving.
+
+The car was out. He'd never get through. They'd be waiting for him. It
+was ten miles on foot. Ten long miles over rough ground, gulleys and
+open fields and hills of uncut forest. He'd have to go alone.
+
+Loyce opened the door. For a brief second he looked back at his wife and
+son. Then he slammed the door behind him and raced down the porch steps.
+
+A moment later he was on his way, hurrying swiftly through the darkness
+toward the edge of town.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The early morning sunlight was blinding. Loyce halted, gasping for
+breath, swaying back and forth. Sweat ran down in his eyes. His clothing
+was torn, shredded by the brush and thorns through which he had crawled.
+Ten miles--on his hands and knees. Crawling, creeping through the night.
+His shoes were mud-caked. He was scratched and limping, utterly
+exhausted.
+
+But ahead of him lay Oak Grove.
+
+He took a deep breath and started down the hill. Twice he stumbled and
+fell, picking himself up and trudging on. His ears rang. Everything
+receded and wavered. But he was there. He had got out, away from
+Pikeville.
+
+A farmer in a field gaped at him. From a house a young woman watched in
+wonder. Loyce reached the road and turned onto it. Ahead of him was a
+gasoline station and a drive-in. A couple of trucks, some chickens
+pecking in the dirt, a dog tied with a string.
+
+The white-clad attendant watched suspiciously as he dragged himself up
+to the station. "Thank God." He caught hold of the wall. "I didn't think
+I was going to make it. They followed me most of the way. I could hear
+them buzzing. Buzzing and flitting around behind me."
+
+"What happened?" the attendant demanded. "You in a wreck? A hold-up?"
+
+Loyce shook his head wearily. "They have the whole town. The City Hall
+and the police station. They hung a man from the lamppost. That was the
+first thing I saw. They've got all the roads blocked. I saw them
+hovering over the cars coming in. About four this morning I got beyond
+them. I knew it right away. I could feel them leave. And then the sun
+came up."
+
+The attendant licked his lip nervously. "You're out of your head. I
+better get a doctor."
+
+"Get me into Oak Grove," Loyce gasped. He sank down on the gravel.
+"We've got to get started--cleaning them out. Got to get started right
+away."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+They kept a tape recorder going all the time he talked. When he had
+finished the Commissioner snapped off the recorder and got to his feet.
+He stood for a moment, deep in thought. Finally he got out his
+cigarettes and lit up slowly, a frown on his beefy face.
+
+"You don't believe me," Loyce said.
+
+The Commissioner offered him a cigarette. Loyce pushed it impatiently
+away. "Suit yourself." The Commissioner moved over to the window and
+stood for a time looking out at the town of Oak Grove. "I believe you,"
+he said abruptly.
+
+Loyce sagged. "Thank God."
+
+"So you got away." The Commissioner shook his head. "You were down in
+your cellar instead of at work. A freak chance. One in a million."
+
+Loyce sipped some of the black coffee they had brought him. "I have a
+theory," he murmured.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"About them. Who they are. They take over one area at a time. Starting
+at the top--the highest level of authority. Working down from there in a
+widening circle. When they're firmly in control they go on to the next
+town. They spread, slowly, very gradually. I think it's been going on
+for a long time."
+
+"A long time?"
+
+"Thousands of years. I don't think it's new."
+
+"Why do you say that?"
+
+"When I was a kid.... A picture they showed us in Bible League. A
+religious picture--an old print. The enemy gods, defeated by Jehovah.
+Moloch, Beelzebub, Moab, Baalin, Ashtaroth--"
+
+"So?"
+
+"They were all represented by figures." Loyce looked up at the
+Commissioner. "Beelzebub was represented as--a giant fly."
+
+The Commissioner grunted. "An old struggle."
+
+"They've been defeated. The Bible is an account of their defeats. They
+make gains--but finally they're defeated."
+
+"Why defeated?"
+
+"They can't get everyone. They didn't get me. And they never got the
+Hebrews. The Hebrews carried the message to the whole world. The
+realization of the danger. The two men on the bus. I think they
+understood. Had escaped, like I did." He clenched his fists. "I killed
+one of them. I made a mistake. I was afraid to take a chance."
+
+The Commissioner nodded. "Yes, they undoubtedly had escaped, as you did.
+Freak accidents. But the rest of the town was firmly in control." He
+turned from the window. "Well, Mr. Loyce. You seem to have figured
+everything out."
+
+"Not everything. The hanging man. The dead man hanging from the
+lamppost. I don't understand that. _Why?_ Why did they deliberately hang
+him there?"
+
+"That would seem simple." The Commissioner smiled faintly. "_Bait._"
+
+Loyce stiffened. His heart stopped beating. "Bait? What do you mean?"
+
+"To draw you out. Make you declare yourself. So they'd know who was
+under control--and who had escaped."
+
+Loyce recoiled with horror. "Then they _expected_ failures! They
+anticipated--" He broke off. "They were ready with a trap."
+
+"And you showed yourself. You reacted. You made yourself known." The
+Commissioner abruptly moved toward the door. "Come along, Loyce. There's
+a lot to do. We must get moving. There's no time to waste."
+
+Loyce started slowly to his feet, numbed. "And the man. _Who was the
+man?_ I never saw him before. He wasn't a local man. He was a stranger.
+All muddy and dirty, his face cut, slashed--"
+
+There was a strange look on the Commissioner's face as he answered.
+"Maybe," he said softly, "you'll understand that, too. Come along with
+me, Mr. Loyce." He held the door open, his eyes gleaming. Loyce caught a
+glimpse of the street in front of the police station. Policemen, a
+platform of some sort. A telephone pole--and a rope! "Right this way,"
+the Commissioner said, smiling coldly.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As the sun set, the vice-president of the Oak Grove Merchants' Bank came
+up out of the vault, threw the heavy time locks, put on his hat and
+coat, and hurried outside onto the sidewalk. Only a few people were
+there, hurrying home to dinner.
+
+"Good night," the guard said, locking the door after him.
+
+"Good night," Clarence Mason murmured. He started along the street
+toward his car. He was tired. He had been working all day down in the
+vault, examining the lay-out of the safety deposit boxes to see if there
+was room for another tier. He was glad to be finished.
+
+At the corner he halted. The street lights had not yet come on. The
+street was dim. Everything was vague. He looked around--and froze.
+
+From the telephone pole in front of the police station, something large
+and shapeless hung. It moved a little with the wind.
+
+What the hell was it?
+
+Mason approached it warily. He wanted to get home. He was tired and
+hungry. He thought of his wife, his kids, a hot meal on the dinner
+table. But there was something about the dark bundle, something ominous
+and ugly. The light was bad; he couldn't tell what it was. Yet it drew
+him on, made him move closer for a better look. The shapeless thing made
+him uneasy. He was frightened by it. Frightened--and fascinated.
+
+And the strange part was that nobody else seemed to notice it.
\ No newline at end of file

Dickish/dick.py

+from datetime import datetime
+
+from glossolalia.loader import load_seeds, load_texts
+from glossolalia.lstm import LisSansTaMaman
+
+"""
+Jets. atomic answer. peterson said.
+"can you come to have to get back to the moon base?"
+The old came back and stood at the door.
+Uneasily in the heat lay the police
+the optus went down at him, its eyes identical and expressionless.
+hard to be space commissioner.
+i've a strange can't be operate the same way
+we're a day of mechanical
+he saw his forehead. and he had to be hard to get it.
+he was a long way from the big ground
+he had to be a few paces
+a thin figure with a universe
+"""
+
+
+def train():
+    # should_train = True
+    nb_words = 50
+    nb_epoch = 100
+    nb_layers = 100
+    dropout = .3
+    validation_split = 0.2
+    lstm = LisSansTaMaman(nb_layers, dropout, validation_split, debug=True)
+    filename_output = "./output/dickish_%i-d%.1f_%s.txt" % (
+        nb_layers, dropout, datetime.now().strftime("%y%m%d_%H%M"))
+
+    corpus = load_texts()
+    print("Corpus:", corpus[:10])
+    lstm.create_model(corpus)
+
+    with open(filename_output, "a+") as f:
+        for i in range(0, nb_epoch, 10):
+            lstm.fit(epochs=min(i + 10, nb_epoch), initial_epoch=i,
+                     validation_split=validation_split)
+
+            for output in lstm.predict_seeds(nb_words):
+                print(output)
+                f.writelines(output)
+
+        for i, seed in enumerate(load_seeds(corpus, 5)):
+            output = lstm.predict(seed, nb_words)
+            print("%i %s -> %s" % (i, seed, output))
+            f.writelines(output)
+
+        while True:
+            input_text = input("> ")
+            text = lstm.predict(input_text, nb_words)
+            print(text)
+            f.writelines("%s\n" % text)
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    train()

NicolasVerne/run_transformers.py

+#!/usr/bin/env python3
+# coding=utf-8
+# Copyright 2018 Google AI, Google Brain and Carnegie Mellon University Authors and the HuggingFace Inc. team.
+# Copyright (c) 2018, NVIDIA CORPORATION.  All rights reserved.
+#
+# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+# You may obtain a copy of the License at
+#
+#     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+#
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+# limitations under the License.
+""" Conditional text generation with the auto-regressive models of the library (GPT/GPT-2/CTRL/Transformer-XL/XLNet)
+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers/blob/master/examples/run_generation.py
+"""
+from __future__ import absolute_import, division, print_function, unicode_literals
+
+import argparse
+import logging
+
+import numpy as np
+import torch
+import torch.nn.functional as F
+from tqdm import trange
+from transformers import CTRLLMHeadModel, CTRLTokenizer
+from transformers import GPT2Config, OpenAIGPTConfig, XLNetConfig, TransfoXLConfig, XLMConfig, CTRLConfig
+from transformers import GPT2LMHeadModel, GPT2Tokenizer
+from transformers import OpenAIGPTLMHeadModel, OpenAIGPTTokenizer
+from transformers import TransfoXLLMHeadModel, TransfoXLTokenizer
+from transformers import XLMWithLMHeadModel, XLMTokenizer
+from transformers import XLNetLMHeadModel, XLNetTokenizer
+
+logging.basicConfig(format='%(asctime)s - %(levelname)s - %(name)s -   %(message)s',
+                    datefmt='%m/%d/%Y %H:%M:%S',
+                    level=logging.INFO)
+logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
+
+MAX_LENGTH = int(10000)  # Hardcoded max length to avoid infinite loop
+
+ALL_MODELS = sum((tuple(conf.pretrained_config_archive_map.keys()) for conf in
+                  (GPT2Config, OpenAIGPTConfig, XLNetConfig, TransfoXLConfig, XLMConfig, CTRLConfig)), ())
+
+MODEL_CLASSES = {
+    'gpt2': (GPT2LMHeadModel, GPT2Tokenizer),
+    'ctrl': (CTRLLMHeadModel, CTRLTokenizer),
+    'openai-gpt': (OpenAIGPTLMHeadModel, OpenAIGPTTokenizer),
+    'xlnet': (XLNetLMHeadModel, XLNetTokenizer),
+    'transfo-xl': (TransfoXLLMHeadModel, TransfoXLTokenizer),
+    'xlm': (XLMWithLMHeadModel, XLMTokenizer),
+}
+
+# Padding text to help Transformer-XL and XLNet with short prompts as proposed by Aman Rusia
+# in https://github.com/rusiaaman/XLNet-gen#methodology
+# and https://medium.com/@amanrusia/xlnet-speaks-comparison-to-gpt-2-ea1a4e9ba39e
+PADDING_TEXT = """ In 1991, the remains of Russian Tsar Nicholas II and his family
+(except for Alexei and Maria) are discovered.
+The voice of Nicholas's young son, Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, narrates the
+remainder of the story. 1883 Western Siberia,
+a young Grigori Rasputin is asked by his father and a group of men to perform magic.
+Rasputin has a vision and denounces one of the men as a horse thief. Although his
+father initially slaps him for making such an accusation, Rasputin watches as the
+man is chased outside and beaten. Twenty years later, Rasputin sees a vision of
+the Virgin Mary, prompting him to become a priest. Rasputin quickly becomes famous,
+with people, even a bishop, begging for his blessing. <eod> </s> <eos>"""
+
+
+def set_seed(args):
+    np.random.seed(args.seed)
+    torch.manual_seed(args.seed)
+    if args.n_gpu > 0:
+        torch.cuda.manual_seed_all(args.seed)
+
+
+def top_k_top_p_filtering(logits, top_k=0, top_p=0.0, filter_value=-float('Inf')):
+    """ Filter a distribution of logits using top-k and/or nucleus (top-p) filtering
+        Args:
+            logits: logits distribution shape (batch size x vocabulary size)
+            top_k > 0: keep only top k tokens with highest probability (top-k filtering).
+            top_p > 0.0: keep the top tokens with cumulative probability >= top_p (nucleus filtering).
+                Nucleus filtering is described in Holtzman et al. (http://arxiv.org/abs/1904.09751)
+        From: https://gist.github.com/thomwolf/1a5a29f6962089e871b94cbd09daf317
+    """
+    top_k = min(top_k, logits.size(-1))  # Safety check
+    if top_k > 0:
+        # Remove all tokens with a probability less than the last token of the top-k
+        indices_to_remove = logits < torch.topk(logits, top_k)[0][..., -1, None]
+        logits[indices_to_remove] = filter_value
+
+    if top_p > 0.0:
+        sorted_logits, sorted_indices = torch.sort(logits, descending=True)
+        cumulative_probs = torch.cumsum(F.softmax(sorted_logits, dim=-1), dim=-1)
+
+        # Remove tokens with cumulative probability above the threshold
+        sorted_indices_to_remove = cumulative_probs > top_p
+        # Shift the indices to the right to keep also the first token above the threshold
+        sorted_indices_to_remove[..., 1:] = sorted_indices_to_remove[..., :-1].clone()
+        sorted_indices_to_remove[..., 0] = 0
+
+        # scatter sorted tensors to original indexing
+        indices_to_remove = sorted_indices_to_remove.scatter(dim=1, index=sorted_indices, src=sorted_indices_to_remove)
+        logits[indices_to_remove] = filter_value
+    return logits
+
+
+def sample_sequence(model, length, context, num_samples=1, temperature=1, top_k=0, top_p=0.0, repetition_penalty=1.0,
+                    is_xlnet=False, is_xlm_mlm=False, xlm_mask_token=None, xlm_lang=None, device='cpu'):
+    context = torch.tensor(context, dtype=torch.long, device=device)
+    context = context.unsqueeze(0).repeat(num_samples, 1)
+    generated = context
+    with torch.no_grad():
+        for _ in trange(length):
+
+            inputs = {'input_ids': generated}
+            if is_xlnet:
+                # XLNet is a direct (predict same token, not next token) and bi-directional model by default
+                # => need one additional dummy token in the input (will be masked), attention mask and target mapping (see model docstring)
+                input_ids = torch.cat((generated, torch.zeros((1, 1), dtype=torch.long, device=device)), dim=1)
+                perm_mask = torch.zeros((1, input_ids.shape[1], input_ids.shape[1]), dtype=torch.float, device=device)
+                perm_mask[:, :, -1] = 1.0  # Previous tokens don't see last token
+                target_mapping = torch.zeros((1, 1, input_ids.shape[1]), dtype=torch.float, device=device)
+                target_mapping[0, 0, -1] = 1.0  # predict last token
+                inputs = {'input_ids': input_ids, 'perm_mask': perm_mask, 'target_mapping': target_mapping}
+
+            if is_xlm_mlm and xlm_mask_token:
+                # XLM MLM models are direct models (predict same token, not next token)
+                # => need one additional dummy token in the input (will be masked and guessed)
+                input_ids = torch.cat((generated, torch.full((1, 1), xlm_mask_token, dtype=torch.long, device=device)),
+                                      dim=1)
+                inputs = {'input_ids': input_ids}
+
+            if xlm_lang is not None:
+                inputs["langs"] = torch.tensor([xlm_lang] * inputs["input_ids"].shape[1], device=device).view(1, -1)
+
+            outputs = model(
+                **inputs)  # Note: we could also use 'past' with GPT-2/Transfo-XL/XLNet/CTRL (cached hidden-states)
+            next_token_logits = outputs[0][:, -1, :] / (temperature if temperature > 0 else 1.)
+
+            # repetition penalty from CTRL (https://arxiv.org/abs/1909.05858)
+            for i in range(num_samples):
+                for _ in set(generated[i].tolist()):
+                    next_token_logits[i, _] /= repetition_penalty
+
+            filtered_logits = top_k_top_p_filtering(next_token_logits, top_k=top_k, top_p=top_p)
+            if temperature == 0:  # greedy sampling:
+                next_token = torch.argmax(filtered_logits, dim=-1).unsqueeze(-1)
+            else:
+                next_token = torch.multinomial(F.softmax(filtered_logits, dim=-1), num_samples=1)
+            generated = torch.cat((generated, next_token), dim=1)
+    return generated
+
+
+def main():
+    parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
+    parser.add_argument("--model_type", default=None, type=str, required=True,
+                        help="Model type selected in the list: " + ", ".join(MODEL_CLASSES.keys()))
+    parser.add_argument("--model_name_or_path", default=None, type=str, required=True,
+                        help="Path to pre-trained model or shortcut name selected in the list: " + ", ".join(
+                            ALL_MODELS))
+    parser.add_argument("--prompt", type=str, default="")
+    parser.add_argument("--padding_text", type=str, default="")
+    parser.add_argument("--xlm_lang", type=str, default="", help="Optional language when used with the XLM model.")
+    parser.add_argument("--length", type=int, default=20)
+    parser.add_argument("--num_samples", type=int, default=1)
+    parser.add_argument("--temperature", type=float, default=1.0,
+                        help="temperature of 0 implies greedy sampling")
+    parser.add_argument("--repetition_penalty", type=float, default=1.0,
+                        help="primarily useful for CTRL model; in that case, use 1.2")
+    parser.add_argument("--top_k", type=int, default=0)
+    parser.add_argument("--top_p", type=float, default=0.9)
+    parser.add_argument("--no_cuda", action='store_true',
+                        help="Avoid using CUDA when available")
+    parser.add_argument('--seed', type=int, default=42,
+                        help="random seed for initialization")
+    parser.add_argument('--stop_token', type=str, default=None,
+                        help="Token at which text generation is stopped")
+    args = parser.parse_args()
+
+    args.device = torch.device("cuda" if torch.cuda.is_available() and not args.no_cuda else "cpu")
+    args.n_gpu = torch.cuda.device_count()
+
+    set_seed(args)
+
+    args.model_type = args.model_type.lower()
+    model_class, tokenizer_class = MODEL_CLASSES[args.model_type]
+    tokenizer = tokenizer_class.from_pretrained(args.model_name_or_path)
+    model = model_class.from_pretrained(args.model_name_or_path)
+    model.to(args.device)
+    model.eval()
+
+    if args.length < 0 and model.config.max_position_embeddings > 0:
+        args.length = model.config.max_position_embeddings
+    elif 0 < model.config.max_position_embeddings < args.length:
+        args.length = model.config.max_position_embeddings  # No generation bigger than model size
+    elif args.length < 0:
+        args.length = MAX_LENGTH  # avoid infinite loop
+
+    logger.info(args)
+    if args.model_type in ["ctrl"]:
+        if args.temperature > 0.7:
+            logger.info('CTRL typically works better with lower temperatures (and lower top_k).')
+
+    while True:
+        xlm_lang = None
+        # XLM Language usage detailed in the issues #1414
+        if args.model_type in ["xlm"] and hasattr(tokenizer, 'lang2id') and hasattr(model.config, 'use_lang_emb') \
+                and model.config.use_lang_emb:
+            if args.xlm_lang:
+                language = args.xlm_lang
+            else:
+                language = None
+                while language not in tokenizer.lang2id.keys():
+                    language = input("Using XLM. Select language in " + str(list(tokenizer.lang2id.keys())) + " >>> ")
+            xlm_lang = tokenizer.lang2id[language]
+
+        # XLM masked-language modeling (MLM) models need masked token (see details in sample_sequence)
+        is_xlm_mlm = args.model_type in ["xlm"] and 'mlm' in args.model_name_or_path
+        if is_xlm_mlm:
+            xlm_mask_token = tokenizer.mask_token_id
+        else:
+            xlm_mask_token = None
+
+        raw_text = args.prompt if args.prompt else input("Model prompt >>> ")
+        if args.model_type in ["transfo-xl", "xlnet"]:
+            # Models with memory likes to have a long prompt for short inputs.
+            raw_text = (args.padding_text if args.padding_text else PADDING_TEXT) + raw_text
+        context_tokens = tokenizer.encode(raw_text, add_special_tokens=False)
+        if args.model_type == "ctrl":
+            if not any(context_tokens[0] == x for x in tokenizer.control_codes.values()):
+                logger.info(
+                    "WARNING! You are not starting your generation from a control code so you won't get good results")
+        out = sample_sequence(
+            model=model,
+            context=context_tokens,
+            num_samples=args.num_samples,
+            length=args.length,
+            temperature=args.temperature,
+            top_k=args.top_k,
+            top_p=args.top_p,
+            repetition_penalty=args.repetition_penalty,
+            is_xlnet=bool(args.model_type == "xlnet"),
+            is_xlm_mlm=is_xlm_mlm,
+            xlm_mask_token=xlm_mask_token,
+            xlm_lang=xlm_lang,
+            device=args.device,
+        )
+        out = out[:, len(context_tokens):].tolist()
+        for o in out:
+            text = tokenizer.decode(o, clean_up_tokenization_spaces=True)
+            text = text[: text.find(args.stop_token) if args.stop_token else None]
+
+            print(text)
+
+        if args.prompt:
+            break
+    return text
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    main()

NicolasVerne/verne.py

@@ -11,9 +11,9 @@ def train():
     # should_train = True
     nb_words = 200
     nb_epoch = 100
-    nb_layers = 128
-    dropout = .2  # TODO fine-tune layers/dropout
-    validation_split = 0.2
+    nb_layers = 100
+    dropout = .3  # TODO fine-tune layers/dropout
+    validation_split = 0.1
     lstm = LisSansTaMaman(nb_layers, dropout, validation_split,
                           tokenizer=PoemTokenizer(lower=False), debug=True)
     #

ZuKurzt/data.txt

+Before the next century is over, human beings will no longer be the most intelligent of capable type of entity on the planet.
+The primary political and philosophical issue of the next century will be the definition of who we are.
+Once a computer achieves human intelligence it will necessarily roar past it.
+The Law of Time and Chaos: In a process, the time interval between salient events (that is, events that change the nature of the process, or significantly affect the future of the process) expands of contracts along with the amount of chaos.
+The Law of Accelerating Returns: As order exponentially increases, time exponentially speeds up (that is, the time interval between salient events grows shorter as time passes). The Law... applies specifically to evolutionary processes.
+Neither noise nor information is predictable.
+Order is information that fits a purpose.
+Sometimes, a deeper order—a better fit to a purpose—is achieved through simplification rather than further increases in complexity.
+A primary reason that evolution—of life-forms or technology—speeds up is that it builds on its own increasing order.
+I quickly realized that you had to have a good idea of the future if you were going to succeed as an inventor.
+This interest in trends took on a life of its own, and I began to project some of them using what I call the Law of Accelerating Returns.
+The twentieth century was like twenty years' worth of change at today's rate of change.
+The ethical debates are like stones in a stream. The water runs around them.
+You haven't seen any biological technologies held up for one week by any of these debates.
+We use one stage of technology to create the next stage, which is why technology accelerates, why it grows in power.
+To this day I remain convinced of this basic philosophy: no matter what quandries we face... there is an idea that can enable us to prevail.
+This... was the religion that I was raised with: veneration for human creativity and the power of ideas.
+The power of ideas to transform the world is itself accelerating.
+Information defines your personality, your memories, your skills.
+A lot of movies about artificial intelligence envision that AI's will be very intelligent but missing some key emotional qualities of humans and therefore turn out to be very dangerous.
+Our intuition about the future is linear. But the reality of information technology is exponential, and that makes a profound difference. If I take 30 steps linearly, I get to 30. If I take 30 steps exponentially, I get to a billion.
+No matter what problem you encounter, whether it's a grand challenge for humanity or a personal problem of your own, there's an idea out there that can overcome it. And you can find that idea.
+Artificial intelligence will reach human levels by around 2029. Follow that out further to, say, 2045, we will have multiplied the intelligence, the human biological machine intelligence of our civilization a billion-fold.
+Science fiction is the great opportunity to speculate on what could happen. It does give me, as a futurist, scenarios.
+If you write a blog post, you've got something to say; you're not just creating words and synonyms. We'd like the computers to actually pick up on that semantic meaning.
+Life expectancy is a statistical phenomenon. You could still be hit by the proverbial bus tomorrow.
+Biology is a software process. Our bodies are made up of trillions of cells, each governed by this process. You and I are walking around with outdated software running in our bodies, which evolved in a very different era.
+Information defines your personality, your memories, your skills.
+I'm working on artificial intelligence. Actually, natural language understanding, which is to get computers to understand the meaning of documents.
+Top 10
+When you talk to a human in 2035, you'll be talking to someone that's a combination of biological and non-biological intelligence.
+By the time we get to the 2040s, we'll be able to multiply human intelligence a billionfold. That will be a profound change that's singular in nature. Computers are going to keep getting smaller and smaller. Ultimately, they will go inside our bodies and brains and make us healthier, make us smarter.
+By 2029, computers will have emotional intelligence and be convincing as people.
+What we spend our time on is probably the most important decision we make.
+Our technology, our machines, is part of our humanity. We created them to extend ourselves, and that is what is unique about human beings.
+I do have to pick my priorities. Nobody can do everything.
+The telephone is virtual reality in that you can meet with someone as if you are together, at least for the auditory sense.
+People say we're running out of energy. That's only true if we stick with these old 19th century technologies. We are awash in energy from the sunlight.
+Supercomputers will achieve one human brain capacity by 2010, and personal computers will do so by about 2020.
+If we look at the life cycle of technologies, we see an early period of over-enthusiasm, then a 'bust' when disillusionment sets in, followed by the real revolution.
+Sometimes people talk about conflict between humans and machines, and you can see that in a lot of science fiction. But the machines we're creating are not some invasion from Mars. We create these tools to expand our own reach.
+All different forms of human expression, art, science, are going to become expanded, by expanding our intelligence.
+By the 2030s, the nonbiological portion of our intelligence will predominate.
+I consider myself an inventor, entrepreneur, and author.
+A successful person isn't necessarily better than her less successful peers at solving problems; her pattern-recognition facilities have just learned what problems are worth solving.
+I'm an inventor. I became interested in long-term trends because an invention has to make sense in the world in which it is finished, not the world in which it is started.
+The story of evolution unfolds with increasing levels of abstraction.
+We are a pattern that changes slowly but has stability and continuity, even though the stuff constituting the pattern changes quickly
\ No newline at end of file

ZuKurzt/zukurzt.py

+from datetime import datetime
+
+from glossolalia.loader import load_seeds, load_text
+from glossolalia.lstm import LisSansTaMaman
+
+"""
+you're not just words in synonyms.
+the amount of chaos. the amount of chaos. the time expands of chaos.
+"""
+
+
+def train():
+    # should_train = True
+    nb_words = 60
+    nb_epoch = 60
+    nb_layers = 128
+    dropout = .3
+    validation_split = .3
+    lstm = LisSansTaMaman(nb_layers, dropout, validation_split, debug=True)
+    filename_output = "./output/zukurzt_%i-d%.1f_%s.txt" % (
+        nb_layers, dropout, datetime.now().strftime("%y%m%d_%H%M"))
+
+    corpus = load_text("./data.txt")
+    print("Corpus:", corpus[:10])
+    lstm.create_model(corpus)
+
+    with open(filename_output, "a+") as f:
+        for i in range(0, nb_epoch, 10):
+            lstm.fit(epochs=min(i + 10, nb_epoch), initial_epoch=i,
+                     validation_split=validation_split)
+
+            for output in lstm.predict_seeds(nb_words):
+                print(output)
+                f.writelines(output)
+
+        for i, seed in enumerate(load_seeds(corpus, 5)):
+            output = lstm.predict(seed, nb_words)
+            print("%i %s -> %s" % (i, seed, output))
+            f.writelines(output)
+
+        while True:
+            input_text = input("> ")
+            text = lstm.predict(input_text, nb_words)
+            print(text)
+            f.writelines("%s\n" % text)
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    train()