The Monadic Universe by George Zebrowski

Author:George Zebrowski [Zebrowski, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sci Fi Short Story Collection
Publisher: Ace Books
Published: 1977-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

HEATHEN GOD

“… every heathen deity has its place in the flow of existence.”

The isolation station and preserve for alien flora and fauna on Antares IV had only one prisoner, a three-foot-tall gnome-like biped with skin like creased leather and eyes like great glass globes. His hair was silky white and reached down to his shoulders, and he usually went about the great natural park naked. He lived in a small white cell located in one of the huge block-like administration modules. There was a small bed in the cell, and a small doorway which led out to the park. A hundred feet away from the door there was a small pool, one of many scattered throughout the park. It reflected the deep-blue color of the sky.

The gnome was very old, but no one had yet determined quite how old. And there seemed to be no way to find out. The gnome himself had never volunteered any information about his past. In the one hundred years of his imprisonment he had never asked the caretaker for anything. It was rumored among the small staff of Earthmen and humanoids that the gnome was mad. Generally they avoided him. Sometimes they would watch his small figure standing looking up at the giant disk of Antares hanging blood red on the horizon, just above the well-pruned trees of the park, and they would wonder what he might be thinking.

The majority of Earthmen spread over twelve star systems did not even know of the gnome’s existence, much less his importance. A few knew, but they were mostly scholarly and political figures, and a few theologians. The most important fact about the alien was that sometime in the remote past he had been responsible for the construction of the solar system and the emergence of intelligent life on earth.

The secret had been well kept for over a century.

In the one hundred and fourth year of the alien’s captivity two men set out for Antares to visit him. The first man’s motives were practical: the toppling of an old regime; the other man’s goal was to ask questions. The first man’s political enemies had helped him undertake this journey, seeing that it would give them the chance to destroy him. The importance of gaining definitive information about the alien was in itself enough reason to send a mission, but combined with what they knew about the motives of the man they feared, this mission would provide for them the perfect occasion to resolve both matters at the same time. In any case, the second man would bring back anything of value that they might learn about the gnome.

Everything had been planned down to the last detail. The first ship carrying the two unsuspecting men was almost ready to come out of hyperspace near Antares. Two hours behind it in the warp was a military vessel—a small troop ship. As the first vessel came out of nothingness into the brilliance of the great star, the commander of the small force ship opened his sealed orders.

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