Clifford Simak - A Heritage of Stars

Meg and Cushing stopped in astonishment, yet somewhat glad at meeting something with which they could communicate. The two great globes rolled forward to meet them, their eyes floating randomly. When they reached one of the stone benches, they stopped to wait for the humans to come up.

#1 boomed at them in his drumlike voice. "Please to sit down and rest yourselves, as we note is the custom of your kind. Then it will be possible to have communication very much at leisure."

"We have been wondering," Meg said, "what had happened to you. That day we talked, you left in something of a hurry."

"We have been cogitating," said #2, "and very much disturbed by the thing you told us—the question that you asked."

"You mean," said Cushing, "What comes after man?"

"That is it," said #1, "and it was not the concept that was so disturbing to us, but that it could be asked of any race about itself. This is much at odds with the viewpoint of the A and B, who seems quite convinced that your race will recover from the late catastrophe and rise again to greater heights than you have ever known before. By any chance, have you met the A and B?"

"No," Cushing said, "we haven't."

"Ah, then," said #2, "to return to the question that you asked. Can you explain to us how you came to ask it? To say of something else that in time it will be superseded by some other form of life is only logical, but for a species to entertain the idea that it will be superseded argues a sophistication that we had not considered possible."

"To answer that one," said Cushing, "is really very simple. Such a speculation is only commonsense and is quite in line with evolutionary mechanics. Life forms rise to dominance because of certain survival factors. On this planet, through the ages, there have been many dominant races. Man rose to his dominance because of intelligence, but geological history argues that he will not remain dominant forever. And once that is recognized, the question naturally rises as to what will come after him. What, we might ask, has a greater survival value than intelligence? And though we cannot answer, we know there must be something. As a matter of fact, it might seem that intelligence has turned out to have poor survival value."

"And you do not protest?" asked #2. "You do not pound your chest in anger? You do not tear your hair? You do not grow weak and panicky at the thought the day will come when there will be none of you, that in the universe there will be nothing like you, that there will be none to remember or to mourn you?"

"Hell, no," said Cushing. "No, of course we don't."

"You can so disregard your own personal reactions," said #2, as to actually speculate upon what will follow you?"

"I think," said Meg, "it might be fun to know."

"We fail to comprehend," said #1. "This fun you speak about. What do you mean by ‘fun'?"

"You mean, poor things," cried Meg, "that you never have any fun? That you don't know what we mean by ‘fun'?"

"We catch the concept barely," said #2, "although perhaps imperfectly. It is something we have not heretofore encountered. We find it hard to understand that any being could derive even the slightest satisfaction in regarding its own extinction."

"Well," said Cushing, "we aren't extinct as yet. We may have a few more years.

"But you don't do anything about it."

"Not actively," said Cushing. "Not now. Perhaps not at any time. We just try to get- along. But, now, suppose you tell us—do you have even an inkling of an answer to the question that we asked? What does come after us?"

"It's a question we can't answer," said #1, "although since you spoke of it to us, we have given thought to it. The A and B contends that the race will continue. But we think the A and B is wrong. We have seen other planets where the dominant races have fallen and that was the end of it. There was nothing that gave promise of coming after them."

"Perhaps," said Cushing, "you weren't able to hang around long enough. It might take some time for another form of life to move in, to fill the vacuum.

"We don't know about that," said #2. "It was something that did not greatly concern us; it was a factor, actually, that we never once considered. It fell outside the area of our study. You understand, the two of us have spent a lifetime on the study of certain crisis points resulting in the terminations of technological societies. On many other planets we have found a classic pattern. The technology builds up to a certain point and then destroys itself and the race that built it. We were about to return to our home planet and inscribe our report when we happened on this planet and the doubt crept in….

"The doubt crept in," said #1, "because of the evasiveness and the stubbornness of the A and B. He refuses to admit the obvious. He pretends, sometimes convincingly, to hold fast to the faith that your human race will rise again, that it is unconquerable, that it has a built-in spirit that will not accept defeat. He talks obliquely about what he calls a phoenix rising from its ashes, an allusion that escapes us in its entirety."

"There is no need to beat among the bushes," said #2. "It seems to us you may be able to abstract an answer more readily than we, and it is our hope that once you have it, you would, in all friendliness, be pleased to share it with us. It seems to us the answer, if there is one, which we doubt exceedingly, is locked within this City. As natives of this planet, you might have a better chance of finding it than we, who are travel-worn aliens, battered by our doubts and inadequacies."

"Fat chance," said Cushing. "We are locked out of the City and, supposedly, marooned here. We are forbidden by the A and B to leave."

"We thought you had said you had not seen the A and B."

"We haven't. He sent a message to us by one of his gossipers."

"The nasty little thing was malicious about it," Meg told them.

"That sounds like the A and B," said #1. "A sophisticated old gentleman, but at times a testy one.

"A gentleman, you say? Could the A and B be human?"

"No, of course he's not," said #2. "We told you. He's a robot. You must know of robots. There is one who is a member of your party."

"Now, wait a minute," said Cushing. "There was something standing at the table's head. It looked like a man and yet not like a man. It could have been a robot. It could have been the A and B."

"Did you speak to it?"

"No, I did not speak to it. There were too many other things.

"You should have spoken to it."

"Dammit, I know I should have spoken to it, but I didn't. Now it is too late. The A and B is inside the City and we can't get to him."

"It's not only the A and B," said #1. "There is something else shut up behind those walls. We know not directly of it. We but suspicion it. We have only recepted it."

"You mean that you have sensed it."

"That is right," said #1. "Our feeling of it is most unreliable, but it is all that we can tell you."

Cushing and Meg went back at the end of the day to the deserted camp. A little later, Andy came ambling in to greet them. There was no sign of the other three. Ezra and Elayne had gone down the butte to talk with the Trees, and Rollo had simply wandered off.

"We know now, laddie buck," said Meg. "The A and B meant exactly what he said. The City's closed to us.

"It was that damn Elayne," said Cushing. "She was Cushing this eternity stuff that she has a hang-up on.

"You're too harsh with her," said Meg. "Her brain may be a little addled, but she has a certain power. I am sure she has. She lives in another world, on another level. She sees and hears things we do not see and hear. And anyhow, it does no good to talk about it now. What are we going to do if we can't get off this butte?"

"I'm not ready to give up yet," said Cushing. "If we want to get out of here, we'll find a way.