Whatever Gods May Be (8 page)

The analyses were damning; for what they subsequently were to discover, would force the Stingers off their new world in less than a week.

The builders of the cities beneath the sands had been relatively small, two-legged beings, maybe one tenth the size of the Thelerick Stingers.  Though they had space-travel capacities, the Stingers concluded that interstellar gallivanting had been beyond their means.  Short jaunts within the solar system were not impossible, however, and the human race on this red planet had even established commerce with another world close to them.

For a thousand years, the red world and their mysterious neighbor planet had lived in peace and prosperity.  Eventually, war erupted, and the incredible forces that both worlds had discovered together from the brotherhood of mutual cooperation, were transformed into horrible weapons of destruction that ravaged the two civilizations completely.

The red world survived total obliteration, but the other planet was blown out of space.  The residue from that horrible culmination of events was still floating around the sun like some tortured ghost in the form of millions of asteroids.  Heartsick, the Stingers recalled their playful wandering through that crowded piece of space; like unwitting children, they had been frolicking amidst a giant cemetery, littered with the nameless tombstones of a murdered world.

Further investigation uncovered the last remaining mystery of the red world's race.  The enemy planet succeeded in unleashing a devastating plague into the atmosphere, which not only transmutated the composition of the air into almost pure carbon dioxide, but also wiped out the red world's plant life.  The Stingers could imagine what an agonizing demise the people of the red world must have endured in the end.  No further records were discovered that would indicate if survivors had flown to nearby planets, and as the last gruesome page of the red planet's past was assembled, the Thelerick Stingers knew that they could not stay.  Squeamish they were not, but the Thelericks realized they could never comfortably plan the foundations of a new start on the grave dirt of a deceased civilization.  For them, the small red planet, resplendent in an ocean of plush sand and earth, was now as revolting as any one of the gas worlds could have been as a choice for a home base.

Once again, the Thelerick Ten took to the vacuum of space.  The Stingers had been saddened by their discovery on the red world, but their souls were still filled with hope.  Three more planets could be counted circling this pleasantly hot sun, and maybe one of them would be the answer to their dilemma.

As they drew nearer the orange star, the Stingers could determine that the innermost planet was a definite impossibility .  The small, scathing world had a surface temperature capable of melting even the Thelerick's rough hide.  And though the second planet out from the sun was of respectable dimensions, it was smothered in hot clouds, driving temperatures on the surface of the world thousands of degrees high.

The choices were rapidly whittled down to the last world ahead, and though they were only thirty million miles away from it, the Stingers were already confident that the third planet from the sun was an equally dismal improbability as its two predecessors had been.  The major drawback against it was the fact that it boasted a surface which was two-thirds water -- an environment abhorrent and alien to the dust-loving Stingers.  Secondly, there was evidence that the planet was already peopled sufficiently; bizarre waves of radiation tickled the Stingers antennae, which they guessed to be some form of artificially produced communication emanating from the blue world ahead.

Additionally, several non-moonlike objects were orbiting the planet under their own volition, which suggested to the Stingers that they were, in fact, spacecrafts housing residents of the world below them.  As they drew nearer, their best guesses were confirmed.  The blue-green planet was a crowded place, bustling with activity.

The Stingers were not disappointed, however; though they had still not found a new home, they were pleased that the universe was at least a more crowded place than they had originally believed it to be.  Life was obviously abundant, and no doubt thrived around millions of star systems like this one.

For a little while, the Thelerick Stingers would visit the blue world ahead and greet the people who lived there.  It would be the first of many they reasoned happily.  Then, once again, they would continue their journey through the stars searching for the planet of their dreams.

None of the Ten noticed the black patch of space next to the blue planet's moon.  Practically invisible, it was still in its early stages of formation.  Fully matured, however, it would specialize in reshaping not only dreams -- but worlds as well.

EIGHT

Neither Voyager IV, nor those who had launched the space probe, had expected it to perform according to plan specifications so early in the mission.  Three days out from Earth, however, and the ship was already hard at work initiating operations its programming insisted should not have taken place for another six years following its scheduled landing on Titan, the largest of Saturn's moons.

But Voyager IV had been put to work early.  Like an anxious tourist, it had seen something irresistible that could not be carelessly noted in the cold wasteland of memory; in the probe's case, a computer tape about two inches long and one inch wide.  Voyager wanted it all on film.  And unlike its three stalwart predecessors, it had taken such action without first conferring with those who had designed it.

Voyager IV was the most sophisticated probe in the series; it was to be the first to actually make a landing on one of the worlds it photographed.  Voyager I, II and III had been denied such honors; after their picture-taking duties, they were put out to interstellar pasture, to float lifeless forever between the stars.  They had also been machines incapable of arbitrary decision-making; subject to control from those on Earth, the earlier Voyager could not make a bleep or burn a booster without explicit instructions from Mission Control.

Voyager IV knew no such restrictions.  Guided by the most recent genius in computer evolution, Voyager IV was an independent thinker in its own elite circle of film probes.  Those who had constructed the spacecraft knew that it would exercise its judgment responsibly.

The black cloud hovering near the moon represented a perfect excuse to abrogate all pre-programmed commandments.  Voyager IV had gone to work.

It could never have known that its maiden contribution to Mankind conversely marked an end for those that created it.

The opaque mass only twenty thousand kilometers from the moon was a complete anomaly; the combined technology of Earth could not have filled in a paragraph of information describing it.  Yet its effect on the world was immeasurably catastrophic.  It came from nowhere, quickly, without warning, somehow, mysteriously disrupting Earth's natural rotation.  Within days, it would turn the world into a churning, primeval pit of fire and ice.  In the past twenty four hours, entire continents had been destroyed and created; tidal waves roared through and buried whole cities; lava now covered half the globe.  Hurricanes and tornadoes, rabid with two hundred mile winds, raged over land and sea.  How the black cloud could inflict so much destruction with little or no power, heat or radiation, was a mystery; the fact that it did, however, was sufficient.  Earth was a dying world that would not live out the week.

Voyager relayed its exciting discovery to Earth, informing all who listened that it was continuing to film.  The phenomena it had spotted was relatively close - no more than twenty thousand miles away at most.  The probes computers did not attempt to identify what it was filming; this was not its job.  Not that it would have helped the anxious scientists back on Earth anyway; the cloud drew an enormous zip on every scanner available.  But as full focus was completely enmeshed in the deadly blackness, another potentially riveting discovery was missed -- or ignored as being inconsequential in light of the Armageddon-like atmosphere prevailing all over the world.

Ten objects raced past Voyager's starboard side, no more than ten city block lengths away.  Whatever they were, they seemed to take as little notice in the spaceship as Voyager did of them.  Chopping up its artwork into a hundred thousand electronic puzzle pieces that only a sister computer back on Earth could reassemble, Voyager relayed its footage of the black cloud home.  The entire process was fast, lasting no more than a minute or two.  Voyager IV then turned its steely attention once again towards the point of light in the sky it would not see for half a decade.  Never again did it look back at its first cinematographic victory, certain that it would reach those who had placed so much confidence in its abilities.

Voyager IV - had it a soul or even emotion - would have been disappointed had it known that its efforts had been all for naught.  The discovery of the century, captured by the magic of movies, would never be seen by anybody.  Inimitable and irrefutable proof of life beyond the stars would forever float uselessly between the orbits of the moon and Mars.

For in less than a minute, the men who designed and built Voyager IV would be dead.

I am tired of tears and laughter

And men that laugh and weep;

Of what may come hereafter

For men that sow to reap;

I am weary of days and hours,

Blown buds of barren flowers,

Desires and dreams and powers

And everything but sleep ...

NINE

Rzzdik Zolan

"Hall opening at 230 plus, Zolan," the metallic voice of Zolan's spacecraft announced tonelessly.  It paused deliberately before adding, "I would like to emphasize my discontent over this decision.  You're making a big mistake."

"Let me worry about that, Rover," Zolan said tonelessly, watching three sets of television monitors display various scenes of activity, all of them military.  Rockets, tanks and an occasional explosion lighted up the screens on Zolan's pilot console directly in front of him.  Zolan reached for a large, brown crescent-shaped flask in his lap and took a swig from it; clearly, what he was watching was something he could not do sober.

He had been on Earth for one hundred years and this had been the worst day for him in that time.  He was watching a world preparing to kill itself.  The machines of war paraded before him on his monitors; a pageantry of mindless death-dispensing, the end of which only Zolan could determine to the minute --thanks to the Rover Starglide.

"Forcing Hall aperture unwarranted and inadvisable.  Significant planetary and stellar perturbation registering within one square parsec." the ship's computer rattled on, as Zolan drunkenly focused on the scenes of war transpiring before him.

"Keep it open, Rover.  We're getting the hell out of here," Zolan snapped, not looking up from the TV screens.

"Recommend, Zolan, that Hall-Scan be terminated.  Normal liftoff procedures can be easily effected in compliance to Hall Travel Regulations.  Recommend, Zolan, we await scheduled Hall interphase to commence in 7.3 solar days."

"No," Zolan said quietly, not looking up from his picture console, "I'm not going to wait a week." Zolan layed both hands on either side of the three miniature television screens, switching his attention quickly from one to the other.  His spectacles hung loosely over his bulbous nose, and he was forced to constantly push them back up where they belonged because of the sweat on his brow and face that made them slip occasionally.  Between reaching for his flask, fiddling with his bifocals, and staring intently at the battle scenes on the monitors, Zolan most closely resembled a bank clerk, completely absorbed in figures that were most unsatisfactory to consider.  An occasional snort of disgust and a shake of the head, only added to this bureaucratic demeanor.

Zolan Rzzdik, Earth Observer to the Admiralty, was not a happy man.

"A hundred years, Rover," Zolan said, looking about the enormous flight deck of his spacecraft and nodding, "that's a long time.  A century of hard work, and you know what's going to happen, Rover o l' boy?" Zolan asked in mock curiosity/ "They're going to blow it up:" he said through another disdainful chuckle.

Finishing, he threw the container across the bridge, stood up, and began to pace back and forth.

"It is an unexpected and unfortunate development, Zolan, and I share your sorrow," the Rover began diplomatically. "But it cannot be allowed to cloud your judgment.  If you force the Hall open this soon, you are jeopardizing the gravitational stability of an entire star system."

"So what?" Zolan grunted, shoving his hands into his overalls, and staring at the Rover's computer panels like a naughty boy, "This is the only inhabited planet in the system.  Let it get tossed around by the Hall a little.  In a few hours, it's going to have the hell beaten out of it by these idiots."

"Nevertheless, Zolan, forcing Hall aperture is unwarranted ..."

Zolan snatched the flask lying on the floor and stormed out of the spacecraft and the barn that enclosed it into the hot desert air.

The Rover could be a royal pain when it wanted to be and Zolan didn't need further aggravation than he already had today.  Of course, he realized that his ship was absolutely correct; to artificially breach the Hall, a natural celestial wormhole which allowed the enormous distances between stars to be brooked, was a dangerous maneuver and could theoretically cause much destruction in the vicinity of space in which it appeared.  Already, the sun in this system was bobbing up and down like a stellar buoy because of Zolan's impatient evocation of the warp, which in turn was affecting the orbital planes of its satellites - one of which Zolan had been living on for the past hundred years.