Edmund Cooper: A Far Sunset

But the United States of Europe was sixteen light-years away and under the present circumstances, their duty to such a remote concept was itself a remote abstraction. What mattered more were the people with whom they had shared danger and monotony and triumph—and now disaster.

So, really, there was no choice. They had to go.

By this time the ship’s armoury was sadly depleted; but there were still enough weapons left for the three men to give a respectable account of themselves if they were challenged by a visible enemy. On the twentieth day of planetfall they emerged from the womb-like security of the Gloria Mundi to be bom again—as Paul Marlowe saw it imaginatively—into an unknown but thoroughly hostile environment.

The designers of the Gloria Mundi had tried to foresee every possible emergency that could occur—including the death, disappearance, defection or defeat of the entire crew. If by any remote possibility, it was argued, such types of catastrophe occurred on a planet with sophisticated inhabitants, it would theoretically be possible for the said inhabitants to take over the ship, check the star maps, track back on the log and the computer programmes and—defying all laws of probability, but subscribing to the more obtuse laws of absurdity— return the Gloria Mundi to Earth.

That, in itself, might be a good and charitable act. Or, depending on the nature, the potential and the intentions of the aliens who accomplished it, it might by some remote chance be the worst thing that could possibly happen to the human race. Whatever the result of such highly theoretical speculations could turn out to be, the designers were of the opinion—wholeheartedly endorsed by their respective governments—that they could not afford to take chances.

Consequently the Gloria Mundi had been programmed to destroy herself on the thirty-fifth day of her abandonment—if that disastrous event ever took place. Thirty-five days, it was argued ought to be long enough to resolve whatever crisis confronted the crew. If it wasn’t, then the Gloria Mundi and all who travelled in her would have to be a write-off.

The designers were very logical people. Some had argued for a twenty-day limit and some had argued for a ninety-day limit. Absorbed as they were in abstractions, few of them had paid much attention to the human element, and none of them could have foreseen the situation on Altair Five.

By the evening of the twentieth day of planetfall, the three r emaining crew members had covered about seven kilometres of their search through the barely penetrable forests and had found not the slightest trace of their companions. They had just set up a circle of small but powerful electric lamps and an inner perimeter of electrified alarm wire behind which they proposed to bivouac for the night when Paul Marlowe felt a stinging sensation in his knee.

He turned to speak to his two companions, but before he could do so he fell unconscious to the ground.

Later he woke up in what was, though he did not then know it, one of the donjons of Baya Nor.

Much later, in fact thirty-three days later, the Gloria Mundi turned into a high and briefly terrible mushroom of flame and radiant energy.

It was mid-morning; and Poul Mer Lo, surrounded by small dancing rainbows, drenched by a fine water mist, was kneeling with his arms tied behind his back. Behind him stood two Bayani warriors, each armed with a short trident, each trident poised above his neck for a finishing stroke. Before him lay the sad heap of his personal possessions: one electronic wristwatch, one miniature transceiver, one vest, one shirt, one pair of shorts, one plastic visor, a set of body armour, a pair of boots and an automatic sweeper rifle.

Poul Mer Lo was naked. The mist formed into refreshing droplets on his body, the droplets ran down his face and chest and back. The Bayani warriors stood motionless. There was nothing to be heard but the hypnotic sound of the fountains. There was nothing to do but wait patiently for his audience with the god-king.

He looked at the sweeper rifle and smiled. It was a formidable weapon. With it—and providing he could choose his ground—he could annihilate a thousand Bayani armed with tridents. But he had not been able to choose his ground. And here he was—at the mercy of two small brown men, awaiting the pleasure of the god-king of Baya Nor.

He wanted to laugh. He badly wanted to laugh. But he repressed the laughter because his motivation might have been misunderstood. The two sombre guards could hardly be expected to appreciate the irony of the situation. To them he was simply a stranger, a captive. That he could be an emissary from a technological civilization on another world would be utterly beyond their comprehension.

In the country of the blind, thought Poul Mer Lo, recalling a legend that belonged to another time and space, the one-eyed man is king.

Again he wanted to laugh. For, as in the legend, the blind man—with all their obvious limitations—had turned out to be more formidable than the man with one eye.

‘You are smiling,’ said an oddly immature voice. ‘There are not many who dare to smile in the presence. Nor are there many who do not even notice the presence.’

Poul Mer Lo blinked the droplets from his eyes and looked up. At first he thought he saw a great bird, covered in brilliant plumage, with iridescent feathers of blue and red and green and gold; and with brilliant yellow eyes and a hooked black beak. But the feathers clothed a man, and the great bird’s head was set like a helmet above a recognizable face. The face of Enka Ne, god-king of Baya Nor.

It was also the face of a boy—or of a very young man.

‘Lord,’ said Poul Mer Lo, struggling now with the language that had seemed so easy when he practised it with the noia, ‘I ask pardon. My thoughts were far away.’

‘Riding, perhaps, on the wings of a silver bird,’ suggested Enka Ne, ‘to a land beyond the sky … Yes, I have spoken with the noia. You have told her a strange story … It is the truth?’

‘Yes, Lord, it is the truth.’

Enka Ne smiled. ‘Here we have a story about a beast called a tlamyn. It is supposed to be a beast of the night, living in caves and dark places, never showing itself by day. It is said that once long ago six of our wise men ventured into the lair of a tlamyn—not, indeed, knowing of the presence or even the existence of such a creature. One of the wise men chanced upon the damyn’s face. It was tusked and hard and hairy like the dongoir that we hunt for sport. Therefore, feeling it in the darkness, he concluded that he had encountered a dongoir. Another touched the soft underbelly. It had two enormous breasts. Therefore, he concluded that he had come upon a great sleeping woman. A third touched the beast’s legs. They had scales and claws. Naturally, he thought he had found a nesting bird. A fourth touched the tlamyn’s tail. It was long and muscular and cold. So he decided that he had stumbled across a great serpent. A fifth found a pair of soft ears and deduced that he was lucky enough to discover one of the domasi whose meat we prize. And the sixth, sniffing the scent of the tlamyn, thought that he must be in the Temple of Gaiety. Each of the wise men made his discovery known to his comrades. Each insisted that his interpretation was the truth. The noise of their disputation, which was prolonged and energetic, eventually woke the sleeping tlamyn. And it, being very hungry, promptly ate them all … I should add that none of my people have ever seen a tlamyn and lived.’

Poul Mer Lo looked at the god-king, surprised by his intelligence. ‘Lord, that was a good story. There is one like it, concerning a creature called an elephant, that is told in my own country.’