Мюррей Лейнстер - Operation - Outer Space

He heard the rockets make the louder sound that was the symptom of descent against gravity.

The world was lifeless. The ship had landed on bare stone, when Cochrane looked out the control–room ports. There had been trouble finding a flat space on which the three landing–fins would find a suitable foundation. It had taken half an hour of maneuvering to locate such a place and to settle solidly on it. Then the look of things was appalling.

The landing–spot was a naked mass of what seemed to be basalt polygons, similar to the Giants' Causeway of Ireland back on Earth. There was no softness anywhere. The stone which on other planets underlay soil, here showed harshly. There was no soil. There was no microscopic life to nibble at rocks and make soil in which less minute life could live. The nudity of the stones led to glaring colors everywhere. The colors were brilliant as nowhere else but on Earth's moon. There was no vegetation at all.

That was somehow shocking. The ship's company stared and stared, but there could be no comment. There was a vast, dark sea to the left of the landing–place. Inland there were mountains and valleys. But the mountains were not sloped. There were heaps of detritus at the bases of their cliffs, but it was simply detritus. No tiniest patch of lichen grew anywhere. No blade of grass. No moss. No leaf. Nothing.

The air was empty. Nothing flew. There were clouds, to be sure. The sky was even blue, though a darker blue than Earth's, because there was no vegetation to break stone down to dust, or to form dust by its own decay.

The sea was violently active. Great waves flung themselves toward the harsh coastline and beat upon it with insensate violence. They shattered into masses of foam. But the foam broke—too quickly—and left the surging water dark again. Far down the line of foam there were dark clouds, and rain fell in masses, and lightning flashed. But it was a scene of desolation which was somehow more horrible even than the scarred and battered moon of Earth.

Cochrane looked out very carefully. Alicia came to him, a trifle hesitant.

"Johnny's asleep now. He didn't sleep at first, and while we were out of gravity he was unhappy. But he went off to sleep the instant we landed. He needs rest. Could we—just stay landed here until he catches up on sleep?"

Cochrane nodded. Alicia smiled at him and went away. There was still the mark of a bruise on her cheek. She went down to where her husband needed her. Holden said dourly:

"This world's useless. So is her husband."

"Wait till we check the air," said Cochrane absently.

"I've checked it," Holden told him indifferently. "I went in the port and sniffed at the cracked outer door. I didn't die, so I opened the door. There is a smell of stone. That's all. The air's perfectly breathable. The ocean's probably absorbed all soluble gases, and poisonous gases are soluble. If they weren't, they couldn't be poisonous."

"Mmmmmm," said Cochrane thoughtfully.

Jamison came over to him.

"We're not going to stay here, are we?" he asked. "I don't like to look at it. The moon's bad enough, but at least nothing could live there! Anything could live here. But it doesn't! I don't like it!"

"We'll stay here at least while Johnny has a nap. I do want Bell to take all the pictures he can, though. Probably not for broadcast, but for business reasons. I'll need pictures to back up a deal."

Jamison went away. Holden said without interest:

"You'll make no deals with this planet! This is one you can do what you like with! I don't want any part of it!"

Cochrane shrugged.

"Speaking of things you don't want any part of—what about Johnny Simms? Speaking as a psychiatrist, what effect will that business of being in the dark all night and nearly being pecked to death—what will it do to him? Are psychopaths the way they are because they can't face reality, or because they've never had to?"

Holden stared away down the incredible, lifeless coastline at the distant storm. There was darkness under many layers of cloud. The sea foamed and lashed and instantly was free of foam again. Because there were no plankton, no animalcules, no tiny, gluey, organic beings in it to give the water the property of making foam which endured. There was thunder, yonder in the storm, and no ear heard it. Over a vast world there was sunshine which no eyes saw. There was night in which nothing rested, and somewhere dawn was breaking now, and nothing sang.

"Look at that, Jed," said Holden heavily. "There's a reality none of us wants to face! We're all more or less fugitives from what we are afraid is reality. That is real, and it makes me feel small and futile. So I don't like to look at it. Johnny Simms didn't want to face what one does grow up to face. It made him feel futile. So he picked a pleasanter role than realist."

Cochrane nodded.

"But his unrealism of last night put him into a very realistic mess that he couldn't dodge! Will it change him?"

"Probably," said Holden without any expression at all in his voice. "They used to put lunatics in snake–pits. When they were people who'd taken to lunacy for escape from reality, it made them go back to reality to escape from the snakes. Shock–treatments used to be used, later, for the same effect. We're too soft to use either treatment now. But Johnny gave himself the works. The odds are that from now on he will never want to be alone even for an instant, and he will never again quite dare to be angry with anybody or make anybody angry. You choked him and he ran away, and it was bad! So from now on I'd guess that Johnny will be a very well–behaved little boy in a grown man's body." He said very wryly indeed, "Alicia will be very happy, taking care of him."

A moment later he added:

"I look at that set–up the way I look at the landscape yonder."

Cochrane said nothing. Holden liked Alicia. Too much. It would not make any difference at all. After a moment, though, he changed the subject.

"I think this is a pretty good bet, this planet. You think it's no good. I'm going to talk to the chlorella companies. They grow edible yeast in tanks, and chlorella in vats, and they produce an important amount of food. But they have to grow the stuff indoors and they have a ghastly job keeping everything sterile. Here's a place where they can sow chlorella in the oceans! They can grow yeast in lakes, out–of–doors! Suppose they use this world to grow monstrous quantities of unattractive but useful foodstuff—in a way—wild? It will be good return–cargo material for ships taking colonists out to our other planets.—I suppose," he added meditatively, "they'll ship it back in bulk, dried."

Holden blinked. He was jolted out of even his depression.

"Jed!" he said warmly. "Tell that to the world—prove that—and—people will stop being afraid! They won't be afraid of starving before they can get to the stars! Jed—Jed! This is the thing the world needs most of all!"

But Cochrane grimaced.

"Maybe," he admitted it. "But I've tasted the stuff. I think it's foul! Still, if people want it … "

He went back down to the communicator to contact the chlorella companies of Earth, to find out if there was any special data they would need to pass on the proposal.

And so presently the ship took off for home. It landed on the moon first, and Johnny Simms was loaded into a space–suit and transferred to Lunar City, where he could live without being extradited back to Earth. He wouldn't stay there. Alicia guaranteed that. They'd move to the glacier planet as soon as hotels were built. Maybe some day they'd travel to the planet of the shaggy beasts. Johnny would never be troublesome again. He was pathetically anxious, now, to have people like him, and stay with him, and not under any circumstances be angry with him or shut him away from them. Alicia would now have a full–time occupation keeping people from taking advantage of him.