West of the Sun. Edgar Pangborn
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He tried to study the dead things as Sears Oliphant would want to do. Two were hopelessly torn; he dug a hole in the humus and dropped those in, smoothing the surface, wondering at his need for an act which could mean nothing to the unhappy morsel of perception on the tree trunk. The third, and the nest, he carried around the boat where the light was better.
All seven digits of the forelimb spread into a membranous wing; the hind leg divided at the ankle, three toes anchoring the wing, the other four fused into a slim foot which had suction pads. He cradled the bit of mortality in his palm, recalling a thing Wright had said when they entered the lifeboat. Captain Jensen, waiting for take-off at the spaceport, trying, as he drank sherry with Christopher Wright, to look at the venture under the aspect of eternity, had said he liked the philosophical implications of Argo’s converter, into which his own body was strangely soon to pass. What was Wright’s comment eleven years later? “All life is cannibalism, benign or not: we are still eating the dinosaurs.” There had been more, which Paul could not remember. So, man drove eleven years through space and killed three babies. But there was no element of malevolence.…
Perhaps there was none in most of man’s actions over the millennia.
Wright crawled out, stiff-limbed and unrested.
“’Morning, Doc. Let me introduce Enigma Luciferensis.”
“‘Luciferensis’ won’t do.” Wright peered down. “Everything is ‘Luciferensis,’ including the posterity Dot mentioned. Well now, what—”
“A nestling. Our crash broke the nest and killed the young.”
Wright fingered the fabric. “Beautiful. Leaves gummed together with some secretion.” With a doctor’s intentness he added: “How d’you feel?”
“Good.”
A shadow circled Paul, settled on his arm, hobbling toward his palm and what it held. He felt the suction cups; with a careful mouth the creature took up its dead and flew away. “I’ve been remembering something you said: life eating life—without too much concern for the second law of thermodynamics. Forgive us our trespasses… Good morning, lady.”
“What did I miss?” Dorothy had glimpsed the departure.
“Lucifer’s idea of a bat. I think that big flying thing I saw from the lifeboat was shaped like this midget. Haven’t seen any birds.”
Dorothy hugged his arm. “Not even one measly robin?”
“Sorry, Whifflepuff—fresh out of robins.”
Wright blinked at his compass. “Meadow that way.” Paul was inattentive, needing the warm quiet of the woman beside him. Wright added: “First, breakfast.” He broke the seal of a ration package and snarled. “Thirty days, I b’lieve you said. Antique garbage—dehydrated hay.”
Dorothy said, “You’re nicest when you’re mad, Doc. We’ll soon have to try the local stuff, I suppose.”
“Uh-huh. But no guinea-pig work for you or Ann.”
She was startled. “Why not? I can digest boilerplate.”
“Two women on Lucifer: valuable livestock.” Wright smiled with his mouth full. “I’m boss, remember? For guinea-pig work, the men draw lots.”
She was grave. “I won’t argue. It so happens—” She peeked into the nest. “Poor little fuzzies lined it with fur. Their own, I’ll bet.”
“It so happens what, dear?”
“Ah… This eleven-year-old gookum claims to be coffee. Can we make a fire? Looks like dead wood over there.”
The branches burned aromatically; the morning was growing into deep warmth, but still with freshness. Wright said, “Coffee my shirt.”
Dorothy tasted it. “Brr…! I was about to say when I interrupted myself, it so happens I’m six or seven weeks pregnant, I think.”
“Six—” Wright set his aluminum cup carefully upside down. Paul mumbled, “That’s what’s been on your mind.”
Behind her eyes he glimpsed the primitive thing, deeper than thought, not like a part of her but a force that sustained her, himself, all others: the three billion of Earth, the small grieving spirit now flown away into the trees. “Yes, Adam. I would have told you sooner, but we all had a lot on our minds.”
“Even before we got in orbit, you saw us settling—staying—”
Dorothy grinned then. “No-o, Paul. I just wanted the baby. Could have been born on the ship. The Federation said no, but.…”
Gradually Paul began to realize it. “But you said yes.”
She leaned to him, no longer smiling. “I said yes.…”
The forest floor hushed footsteps; some coolness lingered. Paul walked in front, then Dorothy, and Wright marked blazes on the tree trunks. Paul glanced backward often, to capture the receding patterns. At the third such pause the lifeboat was no longer visible—only a sameness of trees and sparse young life groping through shadow for the food of the sun. In this depth of forest there was no brush; the going was easy except for the nuisance of purple vines that sometimes looped from tree to tree. Paul searched for any change of light ahead.
The boat held all but what they wore, the two rifles, the three pistols holstered at their hips, the three knives, three sealed ration packages. Damage had prevented locking the door of the boat: to rob, an inhabitant of Lucifer would need only intelligence enough to solve the sliding mechanism. They had seen no life but that huge nocturnal leaf eater, the small fliers, a white worm, and now a few timid ten-legged scuttlers on the warm ground and midge-like specks dancing in shafts of sunlight. Too quietly, Wright said, “Stop.”
Paul raised his rifle as he turned. Only untroubled forest. Wright’s warning hand lowered. “Almost saw it. Heard nothing, just felt a—watching. Might be in my head. Let’s go on. And don’t hurry.”
It would have been possible to hurry, even with an eye on the compass. It would have been possible, Paul thought, to run in panic, fall whimpering and waiting. But you wouldn’t do it.…
No shape in this dim region could be right or wrong; the trees themselves were no sweetly familiar beech or pine. They halted at sight of a new sprawling type of vine, uprooted where a break in the forest ceiling admitted more sunshine. The earth displayed hoof-prints like a pig’s. Some scattered tuberous roots were marked by teeth; Dorothy sniffed one. “Spud with garlic for a papa.” Paul pocketed a sample. She said, “Not that Lucifer cares, Doc, but what time is it?”
“My watch says we’ve been walking fifteen minutes. Take it slow.” Wright presently added: “I’ve had another glimpse. Not a good one. Furry, gray and white—white face, splashes of white on a gray body seven or eight feet tall. Human shape. We may be all right if we don’t bother him.”
“Or blunder into territory where he doesn’t want us.”
“There is that, Paul.”
“Human shape,” said Dorothy evenly. “How human?”
“Very. Upright. Good-sized head… Ah—hear that?” It was Ann’s voice, calling, from someplace where there should be sunlight. “Don’t answer just yet—no sudden noises.”
Close to Paul, Dorothy whispered, “The baby—I don’t want to tell the others quite yet.”
That made it real—so real that in spite of a patch of beckoning blue Paul had to turn to her.
Behind Wright, he saw it, among the pillars of the trees, retreating in fluid slowness till it was only a black ear, part of a white-furred cheek, an iridescent green eye showing, like a cat’s, no white. But the blue was also real.…
The edge of the forest was a mass of young growth fighting for the gold coin of sunlight. “Shield your faces”—Wright was panting—”could