C. M. Kornbluth by Starchild (Omnibus)

Author:Starchild (Omnibus)
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-11-21T23:06:36+00:00

UHBBVIl

24

They burst out into the cold night air. And even in his fear and anguish Andy Quam stared incredulously at the sky.

Overhead lay a lacy net of blue and violet fire. Great pale slow lightnings of color writhed through the heavens, soundlessly and immense; they were so bright that trees cast shadows on the rocky hillside, blurred shadows of color that moved with the supple shifting of the aurora.

The carnivorous citizen thrust its long muzzle forward, past Quamodian’s cheek. He felt its hot, faintly fishy breath on his ear as it whined softly, “This spectacle does aot appear usual. Can you explain it?”

Quamodian said simply, “I think our own sun has gone rogue. I don’t know why.”

“But that’s impossible,” cried the girl. “Sol is not an intellectic body! No trace of volition has ever been detected!”

Quamodian spread his hands, indicating the violence of the aurora. “Then you explain it,” he said.

The distant chorus of the grass-green spirals chimed in, “We have recorded reflected intensity of stellar emissions. They have approximately doubled. Three conjectures: One, that this star is prenova; improbable. Two, that previous soundings to determine intellect in this star have been in error; improbable. Three, that it has acquired volition.”

“You mean it’s gone rogue?” the girl demanded. “What probability do you give that?”

“No assessment,” chanted the spirals. “No known data for comparison.”

“Report to Aimalik!” ordered the giri “You, citizen! You have transcience facilities!”

But the spirals replied, “Our signals from Aimalik are disordered. We cannot comprehend their meaning. Nor can we receive acknowledgment of our own reports.”

Quamodian had had enough. “Forget Almalikl” he ordered. “And never mind about the sun, either; we can worry about that later. Right now I’m worried about a girl. A human girl named Molly Zaldivar. Perhaps she

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is somewhere nearby, with or without the rogue intellect. Can any of you detect her?”

Silence.

“Try!” roared Andy Quam. Then, sulkily, the predator citizen lifted its muzzle.

“For some time now,” it bayed softly, the transcience receptor in Quamodian’s ears converting it into words he could understand, “I have registered the presence of quarry on that far hill.”

“Quarry?”

“An ancestral trait,” the citizen explained. “It is a particular refinement of chemosampling in ambient air. What you call the sense of smell. But—is not Senior Monitor Kwai Kwich ‘human girl’ and are not you ‘human male,’ Monitor Quamodian?”

“Certainly! What about it?”

“Then this quarry cannot be what you seek. It is male. And it is severely injured.”

They’ skimmed over the pitted road, dropped toward the hillside where the carnivore citizen had scented a man. Its sense of smell had not been hi error.

The man was the Reefer, huddled against the trunk of a bent evergreen tree. He looked gray and ill in the flickering colored lights of the aurora. One arm, badly swollen, was in a sling. He gazed up at the flyer apathetically as Quamodian jumped out.

“I want a word with you,” Andy Quam shouted.

The Reefer growled hoarsely, “Make it short I’m a sick man.”

“Where is the rogue? Where is Molly Zaldivar?”

The Reefer shifted his weight awkwardly, flinching from the movement of his arm.

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