Харлан Эллисон: More Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Outstanding Stories of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction

O/G went to the loading dock and stood in the way. The beings ordering the loading mechs said, “You are blocking this shipment! Get out of the way, you old pile of scrap!”

O/G said in his speaking voice, “I am not in the way. I am to board ship for Pardes and it is against the law for this cargo to take my place.” He extruded a limb in gesture toward the stacked cartons; but he had forgotten his strength (for he had been an ore miner) and his new scoop smashed five cartons at one blow; the foam packing parted and white crystals poured from the break. O/G regretted this very greatly for one fraction of a second before he remembered how those beings who managed the mines behaved in the freezing darkness of lonely worlds and moons. He extended his chemical sensor and dipping it into the crystal stream said, “Are fruit drinks for desert worlds now made without fructose but with dextroamphetamine sulfate, diacetylmorphine, 2-acetyl-terrahydrocannabinol—”

Some of the beings at the loading gate cried out curses and many machines began to push and beat at him. But O/G pulled in his limbs and planted his sucker-pods and did not stir. He had been built to work in many gravities near absolute zero under rains of avalanches. He would not be moved.

Presently uniformed officials came and took away those beings and their cargo, and said to O/G, “You too must come and answer questions.”

But he said, “I was ordered by Galactic Federation to board this ship for Tau Ceti IV, and you may consult the legal department of Colonial Relations, but I will not be moved.”

Because they had no power great enough to move him they consulted among themselves and with the legal department and said, “You may pass.”

Then O/G took his assigned place in the cargo hold of the Aleksandr Nevskii and after the ship lifted for Pardes he turned down his logic because he had been ordered to think for himself for the first time and this confused him very much.

The word pardes is “orchard” but the world Pardes was a bog of mud, foul gases, and shifting terrains, where attempts at terraforming failed again and again until colonists left in disgust and many lawsuits plagued the courts of Interworld Colonies at GalFed. O/G landed there in a stripped shuttle which served as a glider. It was not meant to rise again and it broke and sank in the marshes, but O/G plowed mud, scooping the way before him, and rode on treads, dragging the supplies behind him on a sledge, for 120 kilometers before he came within sight of the colony.

Fierce creatures many times his size, with serpentine necks and terrible fangs, tried to prey on him. He wished to appease them, and offered greetings in many languages, but they would only break their teeth on him. He stunned one with a blow to the head, killed another by snapping its neck, and they left him alone.

The colony center was a concrete dome surrounded by a forcefield that gave out sparks, hissing and crackling. Around it he found many much smaller creatures splashing in pools and scrambling to and fro at the mercy of one of the giants who held a small being writhing in its jaws.

O/G cried in a loud voice, “Go away you savage creature!” and the serpent beast dropped its mouthful, but seeing no great danger dipped its neck to pick it up again. So O/G extended his four hinged limbs to their greatest length and, running behind the monster seized the pillars of its rear legs, heaving up and out until its spine broke and it fell flattened in mud, thrashing the head on the long neck until it drove it into the ground and smothered.

The small beings surrounded O/G without fear, though he was very great to them, and cried in their thin voices, “Shalom, shalom, Savior!”

O/G was astonished to hear these strangers speaking clear Hebrew. He had not known a great many kinds of living persons during his experience, but among those displayed in the corridors of the Library basement these most resembled walruses. “I am not a savior, men of Pardes,” he said in the same language. “Are you speaking your native tongue?”

“No, Redeemer. We are Cnidori and we spoke Cnidri before we reached this place in our wanderings, but we learned the language of Rav Zohar because he cared for us when we were lost and starving.”

“Now Zohar has put up a barrier and shut you out—and I am not a redeemer—but what has happened to that man?”

“He became very ill and shut himself away because he said he was not fit to look upon. The food he helped us store is eaten and the Unds are ravaging us.”

“There are some here that will ravage you no longer. Do you eat the flesh of these ones?”

“No, master. Only what grows from the ground.”

He saw that beneath the draggling gray moustaches their teeth were the incisors and molars of herbivores. “I am not your master. See if there is food to gather here and I will try to reach Zohar.”

“First we will skin one of these to make tents for shelter. It rains every hour.” They rose on their haunches in the bog, and he discovered that though their rear limbs were flippers like those of aquatic animals, their forelimbs bore three webbed fingers apiece and each Cnidor had a small shell knife slung over one shoulder. All, moreover, had what appeared to be one mammalian teat and one male generative organ ranged vertically on their bellies, and they began to seem less and less like walruses to O/G. The prime Cnidor continued, “Tell us what name pleases you if you are offended by the ways we address you.”

“I have no name but a designation: O/G5/842. I am only a machine.”

“You are a machine of deliverance and so we will call you Golem.”

In courtesy O/G accepted the term. “This forcefield is so noisy it probably has a malfunction. It is not wise to touch it.”

“No, we are afraid of it.”

Golem scooped mud from the ground and cast it at the forcefield; great lightnings and hissings issued where it landed. “I doubt even radio would cross that.”

“Then how can we reach Zohar, Golem, even if he is still alive?”

“I will cry out, Cnidori. Go to a distance and cover your ears, because my voice can pierce a mountain of lead ore.”

They did not know what that was, but they removed themselves, and Golem turned his volume to its highest and called in a mighty voice, “ Samuel Zohar ben Reuven Begelman turn off your forcefield for I have come from Galactic Federation to help you!!!”

Even the forcefield buckled for one second at the sound of his voice.

After a long silence, Golem thought he heard a whimper, from a great distance. “I believe he is alive but cannot reach the control.”

A Cnidor said, trembling, “The Unds have surely heard you, because they are coming back again.”

And they did indeed come back, bellowing, hooting, and striking with their long necks. Golem tied one great snake neck in a knot and cried again, “Let us in, Zohar, or the Unds will destroy all of your people!!!”

The forcefield vanished, and the Cnidori scuttled over its border beneath the sheltering arms of Golem, who cracked several fanged heads like nutshells with his scoops.

“Now put up your shield!!!” And the people were saved.

When Golem numbered them and they declared that only two were missing among forty he said, “Wait here and feed yourselves.”

The great outer doorway for working machines was open, but the hangar and storerooms were empty of them; they had been removed by departing colonists. None had been as huge as Golem, and here he removed his scoops and unhinged his outer carapace with its armor, weapons, and storage compartments, for he wished to break no more doorways than necessary. Behind him he pulled the sledge with the supplies.