The World Turned Upside Down Part 33

Diane said, dry-throated: "I'll help. So I can be with you. We've got-so little time."

"I'll ask the skipper as soon as the Plumie ship's free."

"Y-yes," said Diane. And she pressed her face against his shoulder, and wept.

This was at 01 hours, 20 minutes ship time. At 03 hours even, there was peculiar activity in the valley between the welded ships. There were men in s.p.a.ce armor working cutting-torches where for twenty feet the two ships were solidly attached. Blue-white flames bored savagely into solid metal, and melted copper gave off strangely colored clouds of vapor-which emptiness whisked away to nothing-and molten iron and cobalt made equally lurid clouds of other colors.

There were Plumies in the air lock, watching.

At 03 hours 40 minutes ship time, all the men but one drew back. They went inside theNiccola . Only one man remained, cutting at the last sliver of metal that held the two ships together.

It parted. The Plumie ship swept swiftly away, moved by the centrifugal force of the rotary motion the joined vessels had possessed. It dwindled and dwindled. It was a half mile away. A mile. The last man on the outside of theNiccola 's hull thriftily brought his torch to the air lock and came in.

Suddenly, the distant golden hull came to life. It steadied. It ceased to spin, however slowly. It darted ahead. It checked. It swung to the right and left and up and down. It was alive again.

In the radar room, Diane walked into Baird's arms and said shakily: "Now we . . . we have almost fourteen days."

"Wait," he commanded. "When the Plumies understood what we were doing, and why, they drew diagrams. They hadn't thought of cutting free, out in s.p.a.ce, without the spinning saws they used to cut bronze with. But they asked for a scanner and a screen. They checked on its use. I want to see-"

He flipped on the screen. And there was instantly a Plumie looking eagerly out of it, for some sign of communication established. There were soprano sounds, and he waved a hand for attention. Then he zestfully held up one diagram after another.

Baird drew a deep breath. A very deep breath. He pressed the navigation-room call. The skipper looked dourly at him.

"Well?"said the skipper forbiddingly.

"Sir," said Baird, very quietly indeed, "the Plumies are talking by diagram over the communicator set we gave them. Their drive works. They're as well off as they ever were. And they've been modifying their tractor beams-stepping them up to higher power."

"What of it?"demanded the skipper, rumbling.

"They believe," said Baird, "that they can handle theNiccola with their beefed-up tractor beams." He wetted his lips. "They're going to tow us to the oxygen planet ahead, sir. They're going to set us down onit. They'll help us find the metals we need to build the tools to repair theNiccola , sir. You see the reasoning, sir. We turned them loose to improve the chance of friendly contact when another human ship runs into them. They want us to carry back-to be proof that Plumies and men can be friends. It seems that-they like us, sir."

He stopped for a moment. Then he went on reasonably: "And besides that, it'll be one h.e.l.l of a fine business proposition. We never bother with hydrogen-methane planets. They've minerals and chemicals we haven't got, but even the stones of a methane-hydrogen planet are ready to combine with the oxygen we need to breathe! We can't carry or keep enough oxygen for real work. The same thing's true with them on an oxygen planet. We can't work on each other's planets, but we can do fine business in each other's minerals and chemicals from those planets. I've got a feeling, sir, that the Plumie cairns are location-notices; markers set up over ore deposits they can find but can't hope to work, yet they claim against the day when their scientists find a way to make them worth owning. I'd be willing to bet, sir, that if we explored hydrogen planets as thoroughly as oxygen ones, we'd find cairns on their-type planets that they haven't colonized yet."

The skipper stared. His mouth dropped open.

"And I think, sir," said Baird, "that until they detected us they thought they were the only intelligent race in the galaxy. They were upset to discover suddenly that they were not, and at first they'd no idea what we'd be like. But I'm guessing now, sir, that they're figuring on what chemicals and ores to start swapping with us." Then he added, "When you think of it, sir, probably the first metal they ever used was aluminum-where our ancestors used copper-and they had a beryllium age next, instead of iron. And right now, sir, it's probably as expensive for them to refine iron as it is for us to handle t.i.tanium and beryllium and osmium-which are duck soup for them! Our two cultures ought to thrive as long as we're friends, sir. They know it already-and we'll find it out in a hurry!"

The skipper's mouth moved. It closed, and then dropped open again. The search for the Plumies had been made because it looked like they had to be fought. But Baird had just pointed out some extremely commonsense items which changed the situation entirely. And there was evidence that the Plumies saw the situation the new way. The skipper felt such enormous relief that his manner changed. He displayed what was almost effusive cordiality-for the skipper. He cleared his throat.

"Hm-m-m. Hah! Very good, Mr. Baird," he said formidably. "And of course with time and air and metals we can rebuild our drive. For that matter, we could rebuild the Niccola! I'll notify the ship's company, Mr. Baird. Very good!" He moved to use another microphone. Then he checked himself.

"Your expression is odd, Mr. Baird. Did you wish to say something more?"

"Y-yes, sir," said Baird. He held Diane's hand fast. "It'll be months before we get back to port, sir. And it's normally against regulations, but under the circ.u.mstances . . . would you mind . . . as skipper . . .

marrying Lieutenant Holt and me?"

The skipper snorted. Then he said almost-almost-amiably?

"Hm-m-m. You've both done very well, Mr. Baird. Yes. Come to the navigation room and we'll get it over with. Say-ten minutes from now."

Baird grinned at Diane. Her eyes shone a little.

This was at 04 hours 10 minutes ship time. It was exactly twelve hours since the alarm-bell rang.

Afterword by Eric Flint Murray Leinster died almost thirty years ago, in 1976, and his writing career had essentially ended by the beginning of the 1970s. During the decades that followed, this once-major figure in science fiction more or less faded away from the public eye. Until I started editing the multivolume reissue of his writings which Baen Books is now publishing, the only important reissue of his writing that had taken place in many years was NESFA Press' 1998 one-volume omnibusFirst Contacts.

This . . . for a man who held the t.i.tle "the dean of science fiction" before Robert Heinlein inherited it. (And it wasn't bestowed on him by an obscure fan club, either-Leinster was given the sobriquet byTime magazine.) When I first started reading science fiction in the early '60s, Leinster seemed well-nigh ubiquitous to me. I couldn't have imagined back then that the day would come when he had completely vanished from the shelves.

What happened? Leinster was no minor writer like several in this anthology, after all: Rick Raphael, Robert Ernest Gilbert, Wyman Guin, some others. All of them wrote well, to be sure-but Leinster published more novels than they did short stories. He might have published more novels than all of their short stories put together. And his total output, even leaving aside the many westerns and mystery stories he wrote under his real name of Will Jenkins, would have buried them. Would have buried most authors, in fact, major or minor.

Part of it, I think, was that the loose human conglomeration you might call "the science fiction community"

was always fairly lukewarm about him. His career in science fiction spanned half a century, in the course of which he was published by many book publishers and appeared in almost all the princ.i.p.al magazines.

Yet, during his lifetime, he only won a major science fiction award once-the Hugo award for best novelette in 1956, for "Exploration Team." In fact, he only received one other nomination for the Hugo: his novelThe Pirates of Zan made the final list in 1960 (losing, not surprisingly, to Heinlein'sStarship Troopers ). He was never nominated once for the Nebula award.

To be sure, the major SF awards like all such awards are notoriously subject to the popularity of the recipient with the relatively small numbers of people who cast the votes. And since Leinster paid no attention to them-he rarely if ever attended a science fiction convention, and had very little contact with other science fiction writers-it's not surprising that they tended to ignore him in return.

But there's more to it, I think, than just personal distance. The key is that famous old saw: "Familiarity breeds contempt." Leinster was there at the creation of science fiction-and he created much of it himself. Name any of the now-recognized subgenres or themes of science fiction and trace them back in time . . . and, as often as not, you will discover that Murray Leinster laid the foundations.

First contact? The name itself comes from a Murray Leinster story.

Alternate history? He published the time-travel story "The Runaway Skysc.r.a.per" inArgosy magazine inthe year 1919-a year before myfather was born. Ironically enough, for a man who was almost never recognized by the awards, the Sidewise Award which is today given out at the annual Hugo ceremony for the best alternate histories of the year . . . was named after Leinster's story "Sidewise in Time," first published seventy years ago.

I could go and on, but I won't bother. Granted, Leinster was never a dazzling writer. His prose is journeyman at best, he was repet.i.tive in his longer works, he recycled plots shamelessly-no fewer than six of his novels are essentiallyDie Hard in s.p.a.ce with the serial numbers filed off-and he wrote a lot of stuff that can only be described as dreck. I know. I've read almost everything he wrote. I edited a reissue of the complete works of James H. Schmitz and never had to hold my nose once. I wouldn't even think of doing the same with Leinster. Still, I could fill twice as many volumes withgood Leinster than I could with Schmitz, simply because he wrote so much more.

And that's what Leinster was, in the end. An indefatigable storyteller, often a superb one, and the writer who, more than anyone, created science fiction as a viable and separate genre in the first place. So have some respect. If we still worshipped our ancestors and kept their shrunken heads over the hearth, Murray Leinster's would be the one in the center.

All the Way Back

by Michael Shaara

Preface by David Drake Before writingThe Killer Angels , his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the Battle of Gettysburg, Michael Shaara practiced his skill by writing SF. Those of you who've read "Soldier Boy," "Death of a Hunter"

(my particular favorite), and this story will agree that he didn't need much practice.

Great were the Antha, so reads the One Book of history, greater perhaps than any of the Galactic Peoples, and they were brilliant and fair, and their reign was long, and in all things they were great and proud, even in the manner of their dying- Preface toLoab: History of The Master Race

The huge red ball of a sun hung glowing upon the screen.

Jansen adjusted the traversing k.n.o.b, his face tensed and weary. The sun swung off the screen to the right, was replaced by the live black of s.p.a.ce and the million speckled lights of the farther stars. A moment later the sun glided silently back across the screen and went off at the left. Again there wasnothing but s.p.a.ce and the stars.

"Try it again?" Cohn asked.

Jansen mumbled: "No. No use," and he swore heavily. "Nothing. Always nothing. Never a blessed thing."

Cohn repressed a sigh, began to adjust the controls.

In both of their minds was the single, bitter thought that there would be only one more time, and then they would go home. And it was a long way to come to go home with nothing.

When the controls were set there was nothing left to do. The two men walked slowly aft to the freeze room. Climbing up painfully on to the flat steel of the beds, they lay back and waited for the mechanism to function, for the freeze to begin.

Turned in her course, the s.p.a.ceship bore off into the open emptiness. Her ports were thrown open, she was gathering speed as she moved away from the huge red star.

The object was sighted upon the last leg of the patrol, as the huge ship of the Galactic Scouts came across the edge of the Great Desert of the Rim, swinging wide in a long slow curve. It was there on the ma.s.someter as a faintblip , and, of course, the word went directly to Roymer.

"Report," he said briefly, and Lieutenant Goladan-a young and somewhat pompous Higiandrian-gave the Higiandrian equivalent of a cough and then reported.

"Observe," said Lieutenant Goladan, "that it is not a meteor, for the speed of it is much too great."

Roymer nodded patiently.

"And again, the speed is decreasing"-Goladan consulted his figures-"at a rate of twenty-four dines per segment. Since the orbit appears to bear directly upon the star Mina, and the decrease in speed is of a certain arbitrary origin, we must conclude that the object is a s.p.a.ceship."

Roymer smiled.

"Very good, lieutenant." Like a tiny nova, Goladan began to glow and expand.

A good man, thought Roymer tolerantly, his is a race of good men. They have been two million years in achieving s.p.a.ce flight; a certain adolescence is to be expected.

"Would you call Mind-Search, please?" Roymer asked.

Goladan sped away, to return almost immediately with the heavy-headed non-human Trian, chief of the Mind-Search Section.

Trian c.o.c.ked an eyelike thing at Roymer, with grave inquiry.

"Yes, commander?" The abrupt change in course was noticeable only on the viewplate, as the stars slid silently by. The patrol vessel veered off, swinging around and into the desert, settled into a parallel course with the strange new craft, keeping a discreet distance of-approximately-a light-year.

The scanners brought the object into immediate focus, and Goladan grinned with pleasure. A s.p.a.ceship, yes, Alien, too. Undoubtedly a primitive race. He voiced these thoughts to Roymer.

"Yes," the commander said, staring at the strange, small, projectilelike craft. "Primitive type. It is to be wondered what they are doing in the desert."

Goladan a.s.sumed an expression of intense curiosity.

"Trian," said Roymer pleasantly, "would you contact?"

The huge head bobbed up and down once and then stared into the screen. There was a moment of profound silence. Then Trian turned back to stare at Roymer, and there was a distinctly human expression of surprise in his eyelike things.

"Nothing," came the thought. "I can detect no presence at all."

Roymer raised an eyebrow.

"Is there a barrier?"

"No"-Trian had turned to gaze back into the screen-"a barrier I could detect. But there is nothing at all. There is no sentient activity on board that vessel."

Trian's word had to be taken, of course, and Roymer was disappointed. A s.p.a.ceship empty of life-Roymer shrugged. A derelict, then. But why the decreasing speed? Pre-set controls would account for that, of course, but why? Certainly, if one abandoned a ship, one would not arrange for it to- He was interrupted by Trian's thought: "Excuse me, but there is nothing. May I return to my quarters?"

Roymer nodded and thanked him, and Trian went ponderously away. Goladan said: "Shall we prepare to board it, sir?"

"Yes."

And then Goladan was gone to give his proud orders.

Roymer continued to stare at the primitive vessel which hung on the plate. Curious. It was very interesting, always, to come upon derelict ships. The stories that were old, the silent tombs that had been drifting perhaps, for millions of years in the deep sea of s.p.a.ce. In the beginning Roymer had hoped that the ship would be manned, and alien, but-nowadays, contact with an isolated race was rare, extremely rare. It was not to be hoped for, and he would be content with this, this undoubtedly empty, ancient ship.

And then, to Roymer's complete surprise, the ship at which he was staring shifted abruptly, turned on itsaxis, and flashed off like a live thing upon a new course.

When the defrosters activated and woke him up, Jansen lay for a while upon the steel table, blinking. As always with the freeze, it was difficult to tell at first whether anything had actually happened. It was like a quick blink and no more, and then you were lying, feeling exactly the same, thinking the same thoughts even, and if there was anything at all different it was maybe that you were a little numb. And yet in the blink time took a great leap, and the months went by like-Jansen smiled-fenceposts.

He raised a languid eye to the red bulb in the ceiling. Out. He sighed. The freeze had come and gone. He felt vaguely cheated, reflected that this time, before the freeze, he would take a little nap.

He climbed down from the table, noted that Cohn had already gone to the control room. He adjusted himself to the thought that they were approaching a new sun, and it came back to him suddenly that this would be the last one, now they would go home.

Well then, let this one have planets. To have come all this way, to have been gone from home eleven years, and yet to find nothing- He was jerked out of the old feeling of despair by a lurch of the ship. That would be Cohn taking her off the auto. And now, he thought, we will go in and run out the telescope and have a look, and there won't be a thing.

Wearily, he clumped off over the iron deck, going up to the control room. He had no hope left now, and he had been so hopeful at the beginning. As they are all hopeful, he thought, as they have been hoping now for three hundred years. And they will go on hoping, for a little while, and then men will become hard to get, even with the freeze, and then the starships won't go out any more. And Man will be doomed to the System for the rest of his days.

Therefore, he asked humbly, silently, let this one have planets.

Up in the dome of the control cabin, Cohn was bent over the panel, pouring power into the board. He looked up, nodded briefly as Jansen came in. It seemed to both of them that they had been apart for five minutes.

"Are they all hot yet?" asked Jansen.

"No, not yet."