Concealment (ss) by A. E. van Vogt

Author:A. E. van Vogt [Vogt, A. E. van]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sci Fi Short Story
Publisher: Astounding Science Fiction
Published: 1943-09-04T00:00:00+00:00

“It seems strange. Surely after fifteen thousand years they could have added something. Colonies are usually static, but not that static.”

She was examining routine reports three hours later when her astro clanged twice, softly. Two messages—

The first was from Psychology House, a single question: “Have wc permission to break the prisoner’s mind?”

“No!” said Grand Captain Laurr.

The second message made her glance across at the orbit board. The board was aglitter with orbit symbols. That wretched old man. disobeying her injunction NOT to prepare any orbits.

Smiling twistedly, she walked .over and studied the shining things, and finally sent an order to Central Engines. She watched as her great ship plunged into night.

After all. she thought, there was such a thing as playing two games at the same time. Counterpoint was older in human relations than it was in music.

The first day she stared down at the outer planet of a blue-white sun. It floated in the darkness below the ship, an airless mass of rock and metal, drab and terrible as any meteorite, a world of primeval canyons and mountains untouched by the leavening breath of life.

Spy rays showed only rock, endless rock, not a sign of movement or of past movement.

There were three other planets, one of them a warm, green world where winds sighed through virgin forests and animals swarmed on the plains.

Not a house showed, nor the erect form of a human being.

Grimly, the woman said into the intership communicator: “Exactly how far can our spy rays penetrate into the ground?”

“A hundred feet.”

“Are there any metals which can simulate a hundred feet of earth?”

“Several, noble lady.”

Dissatisfied, she broke the connection. There was no call that day from Psychology House.

The second day, a giant red sun swam into her impatient ken. Ninety-four planets swung in their great orbits around their massive parent. Two were habitable, but again there was the profusion of wilderness and of animals usually found only on planets untouched by the hand and metal of civilization.

The chief zoological officer reported the fact in his precise voice: “The percentage of animals parallels the mean for worlds not inhabited by intelligent beings.”

The woman snapped: “Has it occurred to you that there may have been a deliberate policy to keep animal life abundant, and laws preventing the tilling of the soil even for pleasure?”

She did not expect, nor did she receive, an answer. And once more there was not a word from Lieutenant Neslor, the chief psychologist.

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