Nick and the Glimmung by Philip K Dick

Author:Philip K Dick
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Published: 2013-07-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

THE father-thing was almost ready. Another few days and it would reach full maturity. It was still a larva, white and soft and pulpy. But the sun of day would dry and warm it. Harden its shell. Turn it dark and strong. It would emerge from its cocoon, and one day when his father came by this spot…

Behind the father-thing were other pulpy while larvae, recently laid. Small. Just coming into existence.

Nick began to move numbly away. Weakly he reached into the darkness, trying to find something to lean on; he fell terribly dizzy and afraid. Turning, he walked a few steps away from the father-thing and the other, newer, larvae—then saw something else. Something which up to this moment he had not been able to fathom.

Another one. Another larva. It wasn’t white. It had already turned dark. The web, the pulpy softness, the moistness, all had gone. It was ready. It stirred a little, moved its arms feebly.

A Nick-thing.

“Dinner’s ready,” his mother called from within the house. “Go and get your father, Nick, and tell him to wash his hands. The same applies to you, young man.” Nick could smell food cooking: their first meal on Plowman’s Planet.

He made his way into the house, found the kitchen and entered it. His mother was carrying a steaming casserole to the neatly set table.

“What’s wrong?” she said when she saw him.

“Something I have to tell Dad,” Nick mumbled, still stricken with numbing fear.

“Pete!” his mother called anxiously. “Nick looks really scared; you’d better come in here. You can finish shaving after dinner.”

His father, strong and good-looking and alert, strode into the kitchen. “What is it, Nick?” he asked, seeing his son’s face.

“Outside the house,” Nick said. “I’ll show you; come on.” He led the way out of their new house, into the night darkness, to the spot where the bamboo-like plant grew—grew with its inner colony of larvae in various stages.

After he had looked at the larvae for a long time, Nick’s father said, “These plants are terribly dangerous.”

“I know,” Nick said.

“It’s good you found them in time,” his father said. “Another few days—”

“Can we kill them?” Nick asked.

His father said, “I don’t see why not.” He continued to stare at the father-thing, “I would have been replaced,” he said, “By one of it.”

“Me, too,” Nick said.

“Yes, yours is almost finished. And it looks like you.” His father’s voice shook. “Exactly like you.”

Nick’s mother came out on to the porch of their new house. “What is it, Pete?” she called anxiously. “Can I see?”

“No,” Nick’s father said. “You go back inside.” To Nick he said, “If we only had some gasoline. We could burn them up.”

“Maybe they’re already dry enough to—” Nick began, and then broke off in horror.

The last shred of moist webs had fallen from the Nick-thing. The Nick-thing moved, swayed; it broke itself loose from the base on which it had grown, then tottered out. It floundered uncertainly. Its mouth opened and closed, and then it reached towards Nick.

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