Intergalactic Stories: 60+ SF Classics in One Edition (Illustrated). Leigh Brackett
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enemy cliff? What's your name?"
"I am Sim, the son of Sim!"
"Sim!"
An old woman shrieked from the cliff above him. She came hobbling down the stone pathway. "Sim, Sim, it is you!"
He looked at her, frankly bewildered. "But I don't know you," he murmured.
"Sim, don't you recognize me? Oh, Sim, it's me! Dark!"
"Dark!"
He felt sick at his stomach. She fell into his arms. This old, trembling woman with the half-blind eyes, his sister.
Another face appeared above. That of an old man. A cruel, bitter face. It looked down at Sim and snarled. "Drive him away!" cried the old man. "He comes from the cliff of the enemy. He's lived there! He's still young! Those who go there can never come back among us. Disloyal beast!" And a rock hurtled down.
Sim leaped aside, pulling the old woman with him.
A roar came from the people. They ran toward Sim, shaking their fists. "Kill him, kill him!" raved the old man, and Sim did not know who he was.
"Stop!" Sim held out his hands. "I come from the ship!"
"The ship?" The people slowed. Dark clung to him, looking up into his young face, puzzling over its smoothness.
"Kill him, kill him, kill him!" croaked the old man, and picked up another rock.
"I offer you ten days, twenty days, thirty more days of life!"
The people stopped. Their mouths hung open. Their eyes were incredulous.
"Thirty days?" It was repeated again and again. "How?"
"Come back to the ship with me. Inside it, one can live forever!"
The old man lifted high a rock, then, choking, fell forward in an apoplectic fit, and tumbled down the rocks to lie at Sim's feet.
Sim bent to peer at the ancient one, at the bleary, dead eyes, the loose, sneering lips, the crumpled, quiet body.
"Chion!"
"Yes," said Dark behind him, in a croaking, strange voice. "Your enemy. Chion."
* * * * *
That night a thousand warriors started for the ship as if going to war. The water ran in the new channel. Five hundred of them were drowned or lost behind in the cold. The others, with Sim, got through to the ship.
Lyte awaited them, and threw wide the metal door.
The weeks passed. Generations lived and died in the cliffs, while the five hundred workers labored over the ship, learning its functions and its parts.
On the last day they disbanded. Each ran to his station. Now there was a destiny of travel who still remained behind.
Sim touched the control plates under his fingers.
Lyte, rubbing her eyes, came and sat on the floor next to him, resting her head against his knee, drowsily. "I had a dream," she said, looking off at something far away. "I dreamed I lived in caves in a cliff on a cold-hot planet where people grew old and died in eight days and were burnt."
"What an impossible dream," said Sim. "People couldn't possibly live in such a nightmare. Forget it. You're awake now."
He touched the plates gently. The ship rose and moved into space. Sim was right. The nightmare was over at last.
Asleep in Armageddon
You don't want death and you don't expect death. Something goes wrong, your rocket tilts in space, a planetoid jumps up, blackness, movement, hands over the eyes, a violent pulling back of available power in the fore-jets, the crash....
The darkness. In the darkness, the senseless pain. In the pain, the nightmare.
He was not unconscious.
Your name? asked hidden voices. Sale, he replied in whirling nausea. Leonard Sale. Occupation, cried the voices. Spaceman! he cried, alone in the night. Welcome, said the voices. Welcome, welcome. They faded.
He stood up in the wreckage of his ship. It lay like a folded, tattered garment around him.
The sun rose and it was morning.
Sale pried himself out the small air-lock and stood breathing the atmosphere. Luck. Sheer luck. The air was breathable. An instant's checking showed him that he had two month's supply of food with him. Fine, fine! And this—he fingered at the wreckage. Miracle of miracles! The radio was intact.
He stuttered out the message on the sending key. CRASHED ON PLANETOID 787. SALE. SEND HELP. SALE. SEND HELP.
The reply came instantly: HELLO, SALE. THIS IS ADDAMS IN MARSPORT. SENDING RESCUE SHIP LOGARITHM. WILL ARRIVE PLANETOID 787 IN SIX DAYS. HANG ON.
Sale did a little dance.
It was simple as that. One crashed. One had food. One radioed for help. Help came. La! He clapped his hands.
The sun rose and was warm. He felt no sense of mortality. Six days would be no time at all. He would eat, he would read, he would sleep. He glanced at his surroundings. No dangerous animals; a tolerable oxygen supply. What more could one ask. Beans and bacon, was the answer. The happy smell of breakfast filled the air.
After breakfast he smoked a cigarette slowly, deeply, blowing out. He nodded contentedly. What a life! Not a scratch on him. Luck. Sheer luck.
His head nodded. Sleep, he thought.
Good idea. Forty winks. Plenty of time to sleep, take it easy. Six whole long, luxurious days of idling and philosophizing. Sleep.
He stretched himself out, tucked his arm under his head, and shut his eyes.
* * * * *
Insanity came in to take him. The voices whispered.
Sleep, yes, sleep, said the voices. Ah, sleep, sleep.
He opened his eyes. The voices stopped. Everything was normal. He shrugged. He shut his eyes casually, fitfully. He settled his long body.
Eeeeeeeeeeee, sang the voices, far away.
Ahhhhhhhh, sang the voices.
Sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sang the voices.
Die, die, die, die, die, sang the voices.
Ooooooooooooooo, cried the voices.
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, a bee ran through his brain.
He sat up. He shook his head. He put his hands to his ears. He blinked at the crashed ship. Hard metal. He felt the solid rock under his fingers. He saw the real sun warming the blue sky.
Let's try sleeping on our back, he thought. He adjusted himself, lying back down. His watch ticked on his wrist. The blood burned in his veins.
Sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sang the voices.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, sang the voices.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, sang the voices.
Die, die, die, die, die. Sleep, sleep, die, sleep, die, sleep, die! Oohhh. Ahhhhh. Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Blood tapped in his ears. The sound of the wind rising.
Mine, mine, said a voice. Mine, mine, he's mine!
No, mine, mine, said another voice. No, mine, mine; he's mine!
No, ours, ours, sang ten voices. Ours,