Collected Short Fiction, page 219
FENDOBAR, The larger of a double-star system in Galaxy RGC18347, giving its name to the entire system. It is ringed by eight planets, only one inhabited and likewise known as Fendobar.
Because of its strategic location just eleven light-years from the Earth system, Fendobar was of extreme importance in the attack on Earth (which see). Starships were customarily refueled on Fendobar before . . .
Coordinates . . .
The inhabitants of . . .
“Most of it’s illegible,” Navarre said, looking up. “But there’s enough here to prove that there was an Earth—and it was just eleven light-years from Fendobar.”
“Wherever Fendobar was,” Helna said.
THERE was silence in the vault for a moment. Navarre said, “There’s no way you can recall the volume dealing with Earth, is there? This book gives coordinates and everything else. We could get there if—”
He stopped. The Genobonian looked at him slyly. “Do you plan to visit your homeland, Earthman?”
“Possibly. It is none of your business.”
“As you wish. But the answer is no; the volume cannot be recalled. It was shipped out with others of its era last year, some time before the great eclipse, I believe—or was it the year before? Well, no matter; I remember not where the book was sent. We scatter our excess over every eager library within a thousand light-years.”
“And there’s no way you could remember?” Carso demanded. “Not even if we refreshed your memory?” The halfbreed’s thick hands shot around the Genobonian’s scaly neck, but Navarre slapped him away.
“He’s probably telling the truth, Domrik. And even if he isn’t, there’s no way we can force him to find the volume for us.”
Helna brightened suddenly.
“Navarre, if we could find this Fendobar, do you think it would help us in the quest for Earth?”
“It would bring us within eleven light-years—a mighty stride toward success. But how? The coordinates are illegible.”
“The Oligocrat’s scientists are shrewd about restoring faded books. They may help us, if they have not yet been warned not to,” the girl said. She turned to the Genobonian. “Librarian, may we borrow this book a while?”
“Impossible! No book may be withdrawn from a closed track at any time!”
Helna scowled prettily. “But if they only rot here and eventually are shipped off at random, why make such to do about them? Come; let us have this book.”
“It is against all rules.” Helna shrugged and nodded to Navarre, who said, “Step on him, Carso. Here’s a case where violence is justified.”
The halfbreed advanced menacingly toward the Genobonian, who scuttled away. “Should I kill him?” Carso asked.
“Yes,” said Helna instantly. “He’s dangerous. He can report us to Marhaill.”
“No,” Navarre said. “The serpent is a gentle old creature who lives by his rules and loves his books. Merely pull his fangs, Carso: tie him up and hide him behind a pile of books. He won’t be found till tonight—or next year, perhaps. By which time, we’ll be safely on our way.”
He handed the book to Helna. “Let’s go. We’ll see what the Oligocrat’s scientists can do with these faded pages.”
THE LITTLE ship spiralled to a graceful landing on the large world.
“This might well be Kariad,” Helna said. “I am used to the double stars in the skies.”
Directly overhead, the massive orb that was Fendobar burned brightly; farther away, a dim dab of light indicated the huge star’s companion.
“Even this far away,” Navarre said, “the universe remains constant.”
“And somewhere eleven light-years ahead of us lies Earth,” grunted Carso.
They had traveled more than a billion light-years, an immensity so vast that even Helna’s personal cruiser, a warp-ship which was virtually instantaneous on stellar distances of a few thousand light-years, had required a solid week to make the journey.
And now, where were they? Fenobar—a world left far behind by the universe, a world orbiting a bright star in a galaxy known only as RGC-18347. A world eleven light-years from Earth.
The Oligocrat’s scientists had restored the missing coordinates as Helna had anticipated. Helna had packed a few things, and the three had said an abrupt good-bye to Kariad. They were none too soon; Marhaill’s police had been stopping all strangers on Kariad and questioning them. Luck had been with them and they had gotten to the cruiser safely.
And they had swept out into space, into the subwarp and across the tideless sea of a billion light-years. They were driving back, back into humanity’s past, into Galaxy RGC18347—the obscure galaxy from which mankind had sprung.
They had narrowed the field. Navarre had never thought they would get this far. Pursuit was inevitable, and he was expecting signs of it at any moment.
“We seek Earth, friend,” Navarre told the aged chieftain who came out supported by two young children to greet the arriving ship.
“Earth? Earth? What be this?”
The old man’s accents were strange and barely understandable. Navarre looked around; he saw primitive huts, a smoking fire, naked babes uneasily testing their legs. The wheel of life had come full; one of mankind’s oldest worlds had evidently entered its second youth.
“Earth is a planet somewhere in this galaxy,” Carso said impatiently.
“I see,” the old man said. “Planets . . . galaxies . . . these are strange words.” Navarre fumed. “This is Fenobar, isn’t it?”
“Fenobar? The name of this world is Mundahl. I know no Fenobar.”
Carso looked worried. “You don’t think we made some mistake, do you, Hallam?”
“No. Names change in thirty thousand years.” He leaned close to the oldster. “Do you study the stars, old man?”
“Not I. But there is a man in our village who does. He knows many strange things.”
“Take us to him,” Navarre said.
The astronomer was a withered old man who might have been the twin of the chieftain. The Earthmen entered his hut, and were surprised to see shelves of books, tapes, and an efficient-looking telescope.
“Yes?”
“Bremoir, these people search for Earth. Know you the place?”
The astronomer frowned.
“The name sounds familiar, but—let me search my charts.” He unrolled a thin, terribly fragile-looking sheet of paper covered with tiny marks.
“Earth is the name of the planet,” Navarre said. “It revolves around a sun called Sol. We know that the system is some eleven light-years from here.”
The wrinkled astronomer pored over his charts, frowning and scratching his leathery neck. After a while he looked up. “There is indeed a sun-system at the distance you give. Nine planets revolve about a small yellow sun. But—those names—?”
“Earth was the planet. Sol was the sun.”
“Earth? Sol? There are no such names on my charts. The star’s name is Dubihsar.”
“And the third planet?”
“Velidoon.”
Dubihsar. Velidoon. In thirty thousand years, names change.
But could Earth forget its own name—so soon?
CHAPTER VI
THERE WAS a yellow sun ahead. Navarre stared at it hungrily through the fore viewplate, letting its brightness burn into his eyes.
“There it is,” he said. “Dubihsar. Sol.”
“And the planets?” Carso asked.
“There are nine.” He peered at the crumbling book the astronomer had given him, after long hours of search and thought. The book with the old names. “Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, Venus, Mercury. And Earth.”
“Earth,” Helna said. “Soon we’ll be on Earth.”
Navarre frowned broodingly. “I’m not sure I actually want to land, now that we’ve found it. I know what Earth’s going to be like: Fendobar. It’s awful when a world forgets its name.”
“Fendobar is called Procyon on these charts,” Carso commented.
“It was the Earth name for it. But now all are forgotten Procyon, Fendobar, Earth. These planets have new names; they have forgotten their past. And we’ll be coming down out of that past. I don’t like it.”
“Nonsense, Hallam.” Carso was jovial. “Earth is Earth, whether its people know it or not. We’ve come this far; let’s land, at least, before turning back. Who knows—we may even find the Chalice!”
“The Chalice,” Navarre repeated quietly. “I had almost forgotten the Chalice. Yes. Perhaps we’ll find the Chalice.” Chuckling, he said, “Poor Joroiran will never forgive me if I return without it.”
NINE planets. One spun in an eccentric orbit billions of miles from the small yellow star; three others were giant worlds, unlivable; a fifth, ringed with cosmic debris, was not yet solidified. A sixth was virtually lost in the blazing heat of the sun.
There were three other worlds—according to the book, Mars, Earth, Venus. The small craft fixed its sights on the green world.
Navarre was first from the ship; he sprang down the catwalk and stood in the bright, warm sunlight, feet planted firmly in sprouting green shoots nudging up from brown soil. Carso and Helna followed a moment later.
“Earth,” Navarre said. “We’re probably the first from the galactic worlds to set foot here in thousands of years.” He squinted off into the thicket of trees that ringed them. Creatures were appearing.
They looked like men—dwarfed, shrunken, twisted little men. They stood about four and a half feet tall, their feet bare, their middles swathed in hides. Yet in their faces could be seen the unmistakable light of intelligence.
“Behold our cousins,” Navarre murmured. “While we in the stars scrupulously kept our genes intact, they have become this.”
The little men filed toward them unafraid, and grouped themselves around the trio and their ship. “Where be you from, strangers?” asked a flaxen-haired dwarf, evidently the leader.
“We are from the stars,” Carso said. “From the world of Jorus, he and I, and the girl from Kariad. But this is our homeland. Our remote ancestors were born here on Earth.”
“Earth? You mistake, strangers. This world be Velidoon, and we be its people. You look naught like us, unless ye be in enchantment.”
“No enchantment,” Navarre said. “Our fathers lived on—Velidoon—when it was called Earth, many thousands of years past.”
How can I tell them that we once ruled the universe? Navarre wondered. How can it be that these dwarfs are the sons of Earth?
The flaxen-haired little man grinned and said, “What would you do on Velidoon, then?”
“We came merely to visit. We wished to see the world of our long-gone ancestors.”
“Strange, to cross the sky merely to see a world. But come; let us take you to the village.”
“IN A MERE hundred thousand years,” Helna murmured, as they walked through the forest’s dark glades. “From rulers of the universe to scrubby little dwarfs living in thatched huts.”
“And they don’t even remember their planet’s name,” Carso added.
“Not surprising,” said Navarre. “Don’t forget that most of Earth’s best men were killed defending the planet, and the rest—our ancestors—were scattered all over the universe. Evidently the conquerors left just the dregs on Earth itself, and this is what they’ve become.”
They turned past a clear brook and emerged into an open dell, in which a group of huts not unlike those on Fendobar could be seen.
The yellow sun shone brightly and warmly; overhead, colorful birds sang, and the forest looked fertile and young.
“This is a pleasant world,” Helna said.
“Yes. It has none of the strain and stress of our system. Possibly it’s best to live on a forgotten planet.”
“Look,” Carso said. “Someone important is coming.”
A procession advanced toward them, led by the little group who had found them in the forest. A wrinkled graybeard, more twisted and bent than the rest, strode gravely toward them.
“You be the men from the stars?”
“I am Hallam Navarre, and these are Helna Winstin and Domrik Carso. We trace our ancestry from this world, many thousands of years ago.”
“Hmm. Could be. I’m Gluihn, in charge of this tribe.” Gluihn stepped back and scrutinized the trio. “It might well be,” he said, studying them. “Yes, could indeed. You say your remote fathers lived here?”
“When the planet was called Earth, and ruled all the worlds of the skies.”
“I know nothing of that. But you look much like the Sleepers, and perhaps you be of that breed. They have lain here many a year themselves.”
“What sleepers?” Navarre asked.
The old man shrugged. “They look to be of your size, though they lie down and are not easy to see behind their cloudy fluid. But they have slept for ages untold, and perhaps—”
Gluihn’s voice trailed off. Navarre exchanged a sharp glance with his companions. “Tell us about these Sleepers,” Carso growled threateningly.
Now the old man seemed frightened. “I know nothing more. Boys, playing, stumbled over them not long ago, buried in their place of rest. We think they be alive.”
“Can you take us there?”
“I suppose so,” Gluihn sighed. He gestured to the flaxen-haired one. “Llean, take these three to look at the Sleepers.”
“HERE WE are,” the dwarf said.
A stubby hill jutted up from the green-carpeted plain before them, and Navarre saw that a great rock had been rolled to one side, baring a cave-mouth.
“Will we need lights?”
“No,” said Llean. “It is lit inside. Go ahead in—I’ll wait here. I care little to see what lies in there a second time.” Helna touched Navarre’s arm. “Should we trust him?”
“Not completely. Domrik, stay here with this Llean, and watch over him. Should you hear us cry out—come to us, and bring him with you.” Carso grinned. “Right.” Navarre took Helna’s hand and hesitantly they stepped within the cave mouth. It was like entering the gateway to some other world.
The cave walls were bright with some form of electroluminescence, glowing lambently without any visible light-source. The path of the light continued straight for some twenty yards, then snaked away at a sharp angle beyond which nothing was visible.
There were small footprints in the soft sand covering the floor of the cave; evidently they had been made by the boys of the tribe who had discovered this place.
Navarre and Helna proceeded to the bend in the corridor, and turned. A metal plaque of some sort was the first object their eyes met.
“Can you read it?” she asked.
“It’s in ancient language—no, it isn’t at all. It’s Galactic—but an archaic form.” He blew away the dust and let his eyes skim the inscription. He whistled.
“What does it say?”
“Listen: Within this crypt lie ten thousand men and women, placed here to sleep in the year 11423, the two thousandth year of Earth’s galactic supremacy and the last year of that supremacy. Each of the ten thousand is a volunteer. Each has been chosen from the group of more than ten million volunteers for this project on a basis of physical condition, genetic background, intelligence, and adaptability to a varying environment.
“Earth’s empire has fallen, and within weeks Earth herself will go under. But, regardless of what fate befalls us, the ten thousand sealed in this crypt will slumber on into the years to come, until such time as it will be possible for them to be awakened.
“To the finder of this crypt: the chambers may be opened simply by pulling the lever at the left of each sleeper. None of the crypts will open before ten thousand years have elapsed. The sleepers will lie here in this tunnel until the time for their release, and then will come spilling out as wine from a chalice, to restore the ways of doomed Earth and bring glory to the sons of tomorrow.”
NAVARRE and Helna remained frozen for an instant or two after he had read the final words. In a hushed whisper he said, “Do you know what this is?”
She nodded. “ ‘As wine from a chalice—’ ”
“Beneath all the legends, beneath the shroud of myth—there was a Chalice,” Navarre said fiercely. “A Chalice holding immortal life—sleepers who would sleep for all eternity if no one woke them. And when they were awakened—eternal life for doomed Earth, death for her enemies!”
“Shall we wake them now?” Helna asked.
“Let’s get Carso. Let him be with us.”
The halfbreed responded to Navarre’s call and appeared, dragging the protesting Llean with him.
“Let the dwarf go,” Navarre said. “Then read this plaque.”
Carso released the squealing Llean, who promptly dashed for freedom. The halfbreed read the plaque, then turned gravely to Navarre.
“It seems we’ve found the Chalice after all!”
“It seems that way.” Navarre led the way and they penetrated deeper into the crypt. After about a hundred yards he stopped.
“Look.”
A wall had been cut in the side of the cave and a sheet of some massively thick plastic inserted as a window. And behind the window, floating easily in a cloudy solution of some gray-blue liquid, was a sleeping woman. Her eyes were closed, but her breasts rose and fell in a slow, even rhythm. Her hair was long and flowing; otherwise, she was similar to any of the three.
A lever of some gleaming metal projected about half a foot from the wall near her head. Carso reached for it, fingering the smooth metal. “Should we wake her up?”
“Not yet. There are more down this way.”
The next chamber was that of a man, strong and powerful, his muscles swelling along his relaxed arms and his heavy thighs. Beyond him, another woman; then another man, stiff and determined-looking even in sleep.
“It goes on for miles,” Helna murmured. “Ten thousand of them.”
“What an army!” Navarre said. He stared down the long bright corridor as if peering ahead into the years to come. “A legacy from our ancestors: the Chalice holds life indeed. Ten thousand Earthmen ready to spring to life.” His eyes brightened. “They could be the nucleus of the Second Galactic Empire.”
