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Title: The haters
Author: Joseph Samachson
Illustrator: Ed Emshwiller
Release date: November 12, 2026 [eBook #79982]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: Space Publications, Inc., 1953
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79982
Credits: Tom Trussel - Stories of Futures Past (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Luminist Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HATERS ***
The Haters
by William Morrison
[Pseudonym of Joseph Samachson]
=They flung themselves across light years of space to show the world
their hatred and contempt. And out among the stars, they learned at
last what hatred could really mean to them and what they hated!=
“We’ll show them,” said Kerman.
Grayson didn’t answer. Kerman was more than half crazy, and he had
been talking about showing them ever since coming on board. Grayson
had got used to him, just as he had got used to all the others. After
all, you couldn’t expect to hire a crew that was exactly normal, not
for a trip like this. You simply picked up what you could get and took
these characters in your stride, and when they started talking in their
different peculiar ways, you didn’t pay attention.
Still, if ever Kerman’s remark had been appropriate, it was at a time
like this. Here was a planet that would have everything they were
looking for. And nobody to stop them from taking it.
McGant, who acted as first mate, came over to him and said, “We’re all
set to land, Captain.”
“Hold off for awhile,” replied Grayson. “I’m checking our observations.”
“There’s nothing to check,” commented McGant sourly. “Oxygen,
temperature, gravity; air pressure--everything’s in the right range.
Radioactivity’s a little high, but that’s the way we want it. Not
enough to hurt, but high enough to be promising.”
“I’m not sure about the inhabitants,” Grayson said.
McGant looked at him oddly. You didn’t get respect from a crew like
this, thought Grayson. Some were slavish, but in general you were lucky
if you got grudging obedience, and didn’t have to dodge a knife in
the back. McGant, now, was not exactly half crazy, but he was a good
quarter of the way gone. And here he was looking at Grayson as if he
considered the latter the one who was weak in the head. Maybe he had
something there at that, thought Grayson.
“There’s no danger from them,” said McGant. “Only one intelligent
species, and not many specimens of them around. And they’re still in
the ape-man stage.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“By Pluto, Captain, it’s obvious enough. Not a building, not a boat,
not a canal in the place. No sign that they’ve ever heard of the use of
tools. No sign that they grow their own plant food or use weapons to
kill their prey. What more do you want of them, an I. Q. test?”
“That would help,” said Grayson. “For lack of it, I’m taking another
look at some of these telescopic films we made.”
“I’ve gone through them. They don’t show any danger.”
“I tend to agree with you. But it doesn’t pay to be careless.”
“Anything you say, Captain,” replied McGant in a respectful voice,
managing to convey his contempt by facial expression alone. “_Somebody_
on every ship has to be careful, just as somebody has to be the ship’s
clown. But I’ll lay two to one that you’re only wasting our time. An
hour from now we’ll be coming in for the landing we should be making
right now.”
“I don’t doubt it,” returned Grayson coldly. He didn’t like that remark
about the clown.
“And then, by Pluto, we’ll start collecting the stuff. We’ll show the
dirty so-and-so’s, Captain.”
“You have restricted objectives,” said Grayson. McGant’s dirty
so-and-so’s, of course, were the inhabitants of his native Mars.
Kerman’s “them” were the officers of the Interplanetary Transport
Service, who had fired him for perfectly justifiable reasons.
Grayson himself wasn’t so petty. The “them” that he was going to show
was nothing less than the entire human race.
He studied the films, running them through three more times, looking
for any clue that might hint at an advanced but concealed state of
civilization, for any sign that the intelligence of the highest race,
the A-race, was above what he called the ape-man stage. There was
nothing.
The intelligent ones were not particularly impressive-looking. They
were about five feet high, rather slender in build, and not at all
humanoid in appearance. They looked like walking lizards, which they
were not. Their jaws protruded and their foreheads receded, as if they
relied more upon their teeth than upon their brains. And Grayson had
learned that in an enemy you had to fear brains more than anything else.
Completely sane or not, McGant was right. After an hour, Grayson gave
the signal, and the ship spiralled in for a landing. It settled down on
a smooth grassy plot that was red and gray with small growing plants.
They got out, their weapons ready, and looked around them. There was
nothing startling, and Grayson wondered why he couldn’t shake off the
feeling of danger. The plants were unusual, of course, but no more
unusual than those of a planet like Venus, for instance. Tall gray
trees, red and gray bushes, blue grass. They were fixed where they
grew, as plants should be, and Grayson saw no reason to fear them.
Still, tests had to be made.
A couple of the men, directed by McGant, were already gathering samples
to make them. They took specimens of the air, the soil, they took the
leaves and bark of different plants. In the ship itself, Stratton, the
biochemist, who was a very kindly and gentle person except when he
took a notion that the Universe was persecuting him, fed the materials
through the electrono-chemical tester system. This read off their
important characteristics in no more than the time that a human analyst
would have taken to focus a microscope.
“No poisons and no very bad skin irritants,” he reported, “except on
one of the larger species of trees, and I don’t think there’ll be much
trouble, Captain, in getting an antitoxin to control that. Some of the
grasses produce mild allergens, but our drugs should handle them.”
No danger from that source then. As for the animals--Grayson heard
the click of a gun going off, and saw a blue animal leap out of the
grass and lie still. Kerman and a couple of others were assembling
specimens of the larger species. Another crew was collecting the
planetary equivalent of insects. Soon they would get together numerous
representative types of animal life, study how the creatures reacted,
find out how easy they were to kill. Another electronic analyzer would
dissect them and report all their important characteristics to the
waiting men.
An hour later, the summarized reports began to come in. By the end of
the afternoon, a hundred small species and a dozen of the larger ones
had been analyzed. There was nothing to be afraid of.
Meanwhile, the rest of the crew had not been idle. Under Grayson’s
direct orders, a dozen of them were scouting at low levels in their
one-man helicopters. If the planet was as rich in the different metals
as it seemed to be, they should have located enough ores to make
fortunes for the entire crew in a single day of mining.
When the reports began to come in over the radio, Grayson knew that he
was right. Their fortunes would be made.
“We’ll show them,” grinned Kerman, almost drooling at the idea of the
money he was going to have.
This time Grayson nodded. He dreamed of what the money would do for
him, and the bitter smile he habitually wore slowly hardened. What a
showing that was going to be.
* * * * *
They operated on a twenty-four hour day, although the period of
rotation of the planet was closer to thirty. It was still dark when
the morning wake-up bell sounded, and the men tumbled out and began to
get the mining machinery ready for operation. A technician, relatively
sane but surly, tested the electron filters in banks, replaced one that
was faulty, gave the mechanical parts a quick once-over, and reported,
“Shipshape, Captain.”
“Start mining.” Grayson had made a map, showing the different ore-rich
areas listed in the preceding day’s explorations. He pointed out Area 1
and said, “Try that first.”
The man nodded. “Could use more equipment.”
“We’ll get along this trip. And next trip we’ll have enough equipment
to go ten times as fast.”
The ’copter with the mining group flew into the surrounding darkness,
its glowlights lighting up the trees for a distance of a thousand
feet ahead. Things were settling down to a routine, thought Grayson.
Everything quiet, everything in order. Absolutely no danger.
McGant came out of the inside of the ship and grinned at him. “No
trouble, Captain?”
“None so far.”
“It’s like I expected. That A-race isn’t dangerous at all. And as for
brains--well, they’ve got just enough to keep out of our way.”
“We didn’t run across any yesterday?”
“There don’t seem to be many around. One of the men came across a
single specimen. He shot at it, but the thing was quite a way off, and
he missed.”
“Tell the men not to kill them. We’ll see if we can tame them and get
some use out of them.”
But he wasn’t actually counting on that. It was enough, he told
himself, to know that the A-race was harmless. From now on, the only
thing that counted was the rate at which the metal could be mined and
brought to the ship.
All the same, he experienced a feeling of uneasiness later, when he
overheard two of the men talking. One of them was jeering, “Don’t tell
me you missed him, Fernald. Why, I thought you could hit a target with
that gun of yours from ten miles away.”
“I can. But I’m not used to the air here, and my range-finder doesn’t
work the way it does on Earth or Mars.”
Then the two men became aware that Grayson was near them, and they
slouched to attention and saluted sloppily. What did the man miss?
Grayson asked himself. An animal at which he was shooting, of course.
But what sort of animal? One of the A-race?
Discipline was bad enough without letting the men know that he had
overheard part of their conversation and wanted to hear the rest of it.
He passed by them, and noticed that they resumed talking in low voices
when he was out of earshot.
The incident annoyed him, and the next day he himself went out with one
of the hunting parties. The animals had learned caution now, and were
in no hurry to show themselves. One of the men had to flush them out of
their hiding places with a strong ultrasonic beam, which he swept in
all directions, and even then they moved so swiftly that they were not
easy to kill. By the time you aimed at them they had changed color and
taken refuge in their next hideout. And then you had to go through the
whole process all over again.
It was an hour before Grayson himself got a shot. When he did let loose
finally it was at a small lizard-like animal only a foot high, that
came placidly out of a burrow thirty feet away and stood there, as if
oblivious of the irritation of the ultrasonic beam, examining the men
with interest.
Grayson’s blast had more power in it than he would have wanted to use
on so small a creature. It caught the lizard full in the middle, and
knocked it back. For a moment Grayson was afraid that he had torn the
thing to pieces.
He hadn’t. As he watched in amazement, the animal picked itself up,
completely unhurt, and moved slowly into its burrow again.
One of the men laughed uneasily. “You didn’t catch it head on, Captain.
You just sideswiped it.”
Grayson said firmly, “I hit it head on.”
“Besides,” said another of the men, “even a glancing shot with that
much power should have killed it.”
“It should have,” agreed Grayson. “Has anybody here killed one of these
things before?”
“I aimed at one yesterday, Captain, but I missed.” It was Fernald who
spoke.
Captain Grayson said sharply, “Sure you missed?”
“Not now I ain’t, Captain. But I thought so at the time.”
“Prentiss,” said Grayson, “flush that thing out with the ultrasonic
beam again. I want another look at it.”
The ultrasonic beam rose to full power. Nothing came out of the burrow.
Grayson’s forehead was damp. He said, “Somebody toss a grenade down
there. That should get it out, in pieces if need be.”
They stepped back and Fernald tossed the grenade. Fernald liked to toss
grenades. The clumps of dirt shot up and out in all directions, and
left a hollow a dozen feet across. At the bottom of the hollow they
could see the small lizard looking up at them. It seemed annoyed that
its privacy had been disturbed, but otherwise not particularly upset.
Grayson stared at it more closely than before. The thing helped him by
standing up on its hind legs so that he could get a better look at it.
The jaws protruded, the forehead receded. It looked like a small-scale,
slightly altered edition of the members of the A-race. “Probably
an earlier and smaller form,” he thought. “It must have the same
evolutionary relation to the A-race as monkeys have to men.”
The thing looked at him and opened its jaws. Grayson heard the thinnest
of squeaks. Most of the sound, he realized, must be in the ultrasonic
range.
Another small lizard popped out of a burrow close by, and disregarding
the presence of the men a couple of dozen feet away, the two things
held a squeaky conversation. Then both turned and moved calmly into the
second burrow.
“Want me to open that one up too?” asked Fernald eagerly.
“Don’t bother.”
Fernald was too anxious. Better keep him under control, or he’d let his
passion for throwing grenades get the better of him.
“I got something a little better than a grenade, Captain,” said one
of the other men. “Midget-sized nuclear bomb. We’ll have to back up,
though, if we want to use it.”
“We’ll try that,” said Grayson. The man moved cautiously to the burrow
and planted the bomb. Then they all moved back. When the bomb went off,
the explosion could be felt a half mile away. Dirt and rocks flew into
the air, and with them the two small lizard things.
When the men approached once more, the two beasts had their heads
together again, squeaking away as before. Apparently they had been
unharmed by the explosion.
Grayson looked at his men and they looked back at him, and nobody spoke.
Finally, Fernald, now no longer fingering a grenade, suggested, “There
seems to be nothin’ much we can do to those things, Captain. And it
would be too bad if they came after us. Maybe we better leave them
alone.”
“I’m afraid we’d better. Back to the ship, every one.”
He spoke calmly, but inside he wasn’t at all calm. He had been right
from the first, there was danger here, terrible danger. So far, by some
miracle, the little lizards had shown no inclination to harm them. But
what if the bombing of their burrows had aroused their anger?
The next day he learned that the small lizards were not invulnerable.
They had set a trap a half mile from the ship, and when the alarm went
off, Captain Grayson looked at the visor to see what he had caught. It
was a big lizard this time, a member of the A-race. The thing stood on
its hind legs within the smooth hard walls of transparent metal and
gazed around it, as if wondering what had happened. It made no sudden
motion, showed no sign of panic. It simply examined the situation in
what seemed to Grayson a very human way.
Something moved at the edge of the visor screen, and Grayson perceived
that a small lizard was inspecting its larger relative through the
transparent metal wall. Half a dozen additional small lizards joined
the first, and for a few seconds they stared placidly at the large
creature inside the trap.
Then the large one acted. Its paws swiped at the metal wall, and the
wall tore. A second later the large one was out of the trap, attacking
the small creatures which surrounded it.
The walls must have caved in completely then, for the visor screen
blanked out. Grayson swore in frustration, and then barked, “McGant,
Fernald! Get a couple of men with midget nuclear bombs and come with
me! I want to see what’s going on there!”
Two minutes later they were in a ’copter, flying over the place where
the broken remains of the trap lay. McGant looked out and said, “All
quiet now, Captain.”
“We’ll land and look around. You fellows keep your bombs ready for use.
They don’t seem to hurt the beasts, but at least they’ll blow them out
of the way.”
As they eased the ’copter to the ground, Grayson sprang out and ran
over to what seemed to be a torn rag. It was what was left of one of
the small lizards. He stared at it in disbelief for a moment, aware
that his heart was pounding with fear. He found it hard to believe.
Fernald said gloomily, “We couldn’t make a dent on that thing, Captain,
but the big one seems to have torn it to pieces in no time at all.
Absolutely no time at all.”
“What’ll happen to us if the big one comes after us?” asked McGant.
Grayson shook his head. “Better not talk about it. So far we’ve been
lucky enough to have it avoid us. God help us if it ever acquires a
fondness for our company,” he told them.
Fernald pointed. “Here’s another little one, dead as a doornail. Looks
like it’s been burned.”
The skin seemed to have been scorched. Grayson said, “That must be one
of the pair we caught with our midget nuclear bomb.”
“So the bomb had an effect after all,” observed McGant.
“Not enough. If we had a full-sized one--”
“Which we haven’t, Captain.”
“Which we haven’t. But if we had, we might protect ourselves. As it
is--” He hesitated. “As it is, we’re getting off this planet.”
“No, Captain!” exclaimed McGant. “By Pluto, we were all going to get
rich here and go back and show them. You can’t go off now, leaving all
that valuable metal untouched.”
Grayson’s lips tightened. “Into the ’copter, you fools,” he ordered.
“We’re going back to the ship, and once we get there we’re leaving the
planet. If you don’t like the idea, McGant, you can stay here with
these lizard beasts. And you can keep any man who wants to stay here
with you.”
The others shook their heads, and Fernald spoke for them. “Not us,
Captain. Not after what we’ve seen them do.”
The flight back to the ship was made in swift silence. Grayson got out
and saw Kerman gaping foolishly at him. “All quiet, Kerman?”
“All quiet, Captain.”
“Get back on the ship. Have Sparks send out a message recalling all
reconnaissance and mining crews. We’re leaving in fifteen minutes.
Anybody not on board in that time stays behind on this planet.”
He ran down the corridor and threw open the door to his office. In the
doorway he stood as if paralyzed. One of the A-beasts was there near
his desk, staring at him. A hole torn in the metal floor showed how the
beast had entered.
His hand swung to the weapon at his belt and then dropped away.
Explosive weapons were useless. The only thing that could save him was
his head, his human brain, the great brain of a race which had set out
to conquer the universe.
A crewman came running down the corridor to him and shouted, “Captain!
They’ve torn a hole in the side! And they’re ripping out the engine!”
Another A-beast suddenly opened the storeroom door and looked out
at him. It was at this moment that Grayson almost realized the full
hopelessness of their situation. But not quite. He knew that the ship
could not take off without extensive repairs, and that he and the other
crew members were prisoners at the mercy of the A-race. What he did not
realize was the most important fact of all.
There came the burst of an explosion from an adjoining corridor, then
screams of panic. There must have been at least half a dozen guns
blasting, thought Grayson. All, he knew, were useless, completely
useless. Not one of them could harm the big lizard-like things. They
could only excite them, enrage them, inspire them to revenge.
He peered around the corner and saw what was happening. Very gently,
two of the A-race were advancing upon a dozen cowering crew members.
Like nurses removing dangerous toys from children who might hurt
themselves, they were taking away the guns and grenades which the
latter had been using.
It was at that moment that the full truth burst upon Grayson. The
A-beasts were not averse to killing. The way in which one of them had
slaughtered the smaller creatures of his own planet showed that. If
they were caring for the human beings it was for one reason alone--that
the human beings were valuable to them, that the human beings knew
things that they needed to know.
And if they could acquire knowledge from the human beings, that meant
that they themselves were intelligent, highly intelligent. That was the
horrible truth, the stupendous danger that paralyzed Grayson’s mind.
His knees buckled under him, and he sank back against a wall and gasped
for breath. For the first time since he had been released from prison,
his fear for the human race was so great that he forgot his hatred of
it.
* * * * *
The A-beasts were very intelligent jailers. To prevent the human
beings from escaping they had removed the ’copter engines and retired,
leaving the prisoners both their quarters and the weapons they needed
to protect themselves against lower beasts. In addition, as protection
against the smaller lizards against which the weapons had proved so
useless, they had thoughtfully left two of their own kind as guards.
The guards picked out Grayson and Stratton, the biochemist, herded them
gently into the captain’s office, and began to question them.
They pointed to different objects and waited to hear the names. Very
obediently, Captain Grayson began to teach them the human language.
“Shrewd,” he told himself, “very shrewd. They’ve picked us two as the
most intelligent of the entire ship. They figured we’d make the best
teachers. Well, barring a touch of insanity, we’re not bad.”
The other man seemed to have been frightened out of his delusions of
persecution. No delusions at this moment, thought Grayson, just the
persecution itself. Stratton said nervously, “They have a good memory,
Captain. They repeat the words we give them without making a mistake.”
In fact, the A-creatures were learning to speak at a rapid rate.
Grayson could not imagine himself learning their language with such
speed and accuracy.
* * * * *
At the end of three days they could communicate with the human beings
with a fair degree of fluency. One of the first questions they asked
was further evidence of their shrewdness. “Why do you have such men?”
Stratton, with his delusions, naturally misunderstood. He began to
explain, “All the men have different duties. One plots the ship’s
course, one takes charge of the engines--”
The A-beast said, “That is not what is meant.”
Grayson nodded. “I think I understand. You want to know why I have such
a peculiar crew. But first, why do you think the men are peculiar?”
“There is not sufficient regularity. We do not know what the human norm
is. But we do know that this cannot be a normal sample. There is too
great a variety of behavior. Some are dull and apathetic, like Kerman,
some are excitable, like McGant. There is both cowardice and reckless
indifference to loss of life. Some obey slavishly, others carry out
orders only as a last resort.”
“A fine crew, aren’t we?” agreed Grayson bitterly. “But for a trip like
this, the bunch I picked was the best to be found.”
“They are irrational. They hate. And they act upon their hatred.”
“Yes, we hate. That is the one thing we have in common. McGant hates
his native planet, which banished him for crimes he had committed.
Kerman hates the Interplanetary Transport Service, which fired him for
petty thievery. Fernald hates the Courts of Justice, which convicted
his father of taking bribes. Some hate for reasons which exist in their
twisted minds only. Others, like me, have good reason for hating the
entire human race.”
The two A-creatures exchanged glances. Grayson said angrily, “Don’t
look superior. If you knew what they did to me, you’d understand. I was
convicted for a murder I didn’t commit. I was sent to a penal colony to
be reconditioned. After I had served ten years--the full period--they
discovered the real murderer, who was by that time on his deathbed, and
died thumbing his nose at them.
“Ten years out of my life--think of it!” His voice choked with rage as
he recalled his wrongs. “The most precious ten years. They couldn’t
make it up to me, of course, but the thing was that they didn’t even
try. They didn’t begin to try. They simply informed me that they’d note
the correction in my dossier, and that I could go about my business as
before, with no stain on my record.”
He hadn’t meant to speak so freely, but now that he had listeners, the
temptation to go on was irresistible. And in the back of his mind was
another reason, a reason only half formed. He would hold nothing back.
Nothing, except--
“They forgot that they had reconditioned me. When I entered the colony
I was a reasonably normal human being. When I left it, I was--as you
see me now. I hated every one. Almost the first thing I did was to
square the account a bit. I had paid the customary ten years for a
human life, paid it in advance. I took what was coming to me by killing
the most brutal of the guards. I felt better then, but I still hated
people.
“While I was in the penal colony, the intergalactic drive had been
discovered. But its use was prohibited indefinitely. The authorities
reasoned that the other galaxies might be full of unknown dangers,
and they didn’t want to bring any of them down upon the Solar System.
Intergalactic exploration was forbidden to all ships but official
Government vessels, which were to be especially trained to take the
necessary precautions.”
He grinned unpleasantly. “Personally I didn’t give a damn whether I
brought danger down upon the Solar System or not. All I knew was that
there were hundreds of thousands of planets yet unexplored, and that
they probably contained enough in raw materials to make fortunes for
everybody in the first few thousand crews to explore them. I started
recruiting a crew as fast as I could.
“As it turned out, I couldn’t get even ordinary criminals to join up
with me. They had too much of a sense of human responsibility, too much
conscience. That’s why I had to fall back on this outfit of haters.
With them--and with me--it’s every man for himself, and devil take the
hindmost.”
“That was what we wished to know.”
Again the two A-creatures exchanged glances, and Grayson thought he
detected doubt. He had been telling the truth, for reasons of his own,
of course, but the truth none the less. He said harshly, “If you don’t
believe me, ask the others. They’ll tell you whether or not I’m lying.
There’s only one thing to add. That is, that we hadn’t counted on
coming across a race like yours. Now we’ll never get back to our native
planet to enjoy the wealth we found.”
If he could only be sure of that! But perhaps they _would_ get back.
There was a good possibility. The ship’s engines hadn’t been destroyed,
they had merely been removed. Perhaps the crew would yet return to the
System and to the people they had so bitterly hated.
“We shall repair your ship. Perhaps we shall build several others like
it. And you will lead us back.”
It was as he had feared. Grayson stared at the two creatures and had
a moment of panic. He hadn’t told them that he had changed his mind
about hating the human race. He hadn’t told them that a man could think
he knew his own mind, knew his own dearest wish--and when face to
face with its realization, perceive that he knew nothing of the sort.
That was one thing he mustn’t tell. Nor must he tell them that he was
terrified now at the nightmare of what would happen when such almost
invulnerable creatures descended upon the weak things that called
themselves “men.” And for a moment he was afraid that they would read
his mind.
That, however, was absurd. If they could do that, they would never have
bothered to ask him so many questions. His thoughts were his own--up to
the point where his own cowardice would force him to reveal them.
But if they could not read his mind in the literal sense, they could at
least judge what he was thinking. One of the A-creatures said, “You are
wondering about us. We have no machinery such as fills your ship, we
lack much of your science. How can we dream of building another ship?”
“Yes, I’m wondering. I don’t understand your race in the least.”
“We have only recently begun to understand ourselves.” The creature
said softly, “We are a young race. Those that look like us but are
so much smaller, like the creatures you call lizards--those are our
ancestors.”
“I thought there was a relationship. But it doesn’t make sense. Those
small ones,” objected Grayson, “are the only creatures we have seen you
destroy.”
“They are the only ones we have to fear,” returned the other.
Not the only ones, thought Grayson. You have us--_me_. Yes, I hated
the human race for what it did to me. It was a blind, reasoning hate,
and some of its members deserved part of what I felt--but no one hurt
me intentionally, no one but the murderer and the guard I killed, and
both of these were themselves enemies of humanity. Now that I’ve got
all that bitter stuff off my chest, I can see it more clearly. But I
can realize too that even at my worst, I never intended to destroy my
own kind. I might have subjected it carelessly to danger, just as a man
will subject himself when he is overconfident of his own ability and
careless of his own life. I wanted people to realize that I had been
unjustly treated, I wanted them to fear my revenge. I would have come
back with millions and lorded it over those who had harmed me, used my
money to punish those in power who had treated me as a mere number on
the list of prisoners.
But I never had any intention of bringing disaster to the System. And
that is what I have done--what I shall have done in discovering you and
your kind, unless I can stop you. I have no weapon now but my mind,
my human mind which you unfortunately cannot read. And this mind I
must use to the utmost to discover your weakness, to prevent you from
fastening yourself upon my people and enslaving them, as I am afraid
you will do if you attack before they are warned.
The A-beast said, “These small ancestors of ours are thoughtless,
stupid. In the struggle for life upon this planet, however, they have
had one advantage. In appearance they seem, as we do, little out of the
ordinary. But no ordinary weapon can harm them, much less destroy them.
They do not even die of old age. They die only when they destroy each
other.
“They must have been formed originally by some tremendous mutation of
the germ plasm. Once in existence, they spread rapidly among creatures
who by comparison were of a completely lower order of strength. It was
not until they had covered the entire land surface of the planet that
they began to come into serious conflict with each other, and thus to
limit their own numbers.
“A few hundred thousand years back, our own race first arose.
It was distinguished at first only by its size. It had the same
near-invulnerability and the same lack of intelligence.
“At first it was only a subspecies of the dominant, smaller race. But
creature against creature, the smaller ones were helpless to combat it,
and it grew in numbers. But the struggle for survival was a desperate
one. Its members had to learn to band together, to hunt their enemies
systematically and relentlessly. We learned to know, each of us, his
own strength. We learned to recognize against what odds we could win
and against what odds we must lose, and we developed our original
language to a level that would permit us to work together.
“Thus we became the intelligent race you see today. In all this,
however, we had no need to master nature as your own race has done. No
ordinary enemy could hurt us, no weapon penetrate our bodies. There
were no perils of nature against which we needed protection. Our only
enemies were the smaller race, these we had begun to conquer by teeth
and claws.
“In the past few years, our intelligence has turned the scale
definitely in our favor. And this same intelligence has enabled us to
foresee that in the future we shall no longer be limited to the few
square miles of land we now inhabit. In a few years, the entire planet
will be ours. What then? We do not die when there is insufficient food,
but we cease to grow and propagate. Shall our race be brought to a
standstill for lack of space in which to expand?
“We had just begun to consider our problem when your ship arrived. You
have given us the answer. Other planets, other galaxies would provide
us with new homes. There remained only one question. Could we build
such a ship as yours to conquer space?
“We studied you and your men and arrived at the conclusion that
individual for individual we were immensely superior to you. Whatever
you could do, we could do with greater ease. But you have a long start
on us. We have therefore been careful to harm no one, even the least
among you, you who have knowledge that we may use.
“On all the planets we conquer, we shall learn. It will not be long
before we acquire the knowledge you yourself have gained over the
course of your entire history.”
And then--Grayson shrugged. “So long as it takes more than my lifetime,
that is a matter of indifference to me.”
He had had a great deal of experience in concealing his true feelings,
and these creatures had known human beings for only a short time.
Nevertheless he had a ghastly fear that they would see through him,
that they would realize that he was lying, and had spoken so freely of
his hate for the human race only because he no longer hated.
These creatures had brains that _were_ superior, he thought
desperately. They had learned the human tongue in a few days, but he
had not the slightest idea of their own language. They were as grown
men to children. And could a child successfully deceive a grown man in
so important a matter?
He might, thought Grayson. Once in a while he might. If he pretended
selfish indifference to anything but his own personal interests, if he
pretended complete and unquestioning obedience, he might.
* * * * *
In the days that followed he realized that even his crew members,
haters of their own kind though they were, felt guilty at the thought
of their great betrayal. Among others, Kerman came to him and said
uneasily, “Say, Captain, these lizards want us to tell them everything
we know.”
“You don’t know much, Kerman,” Grayson said.
“Yes, but Captain, there are some things--”
“Do as they want,” said Grayson, knowing that his own attitude would
be reflected in the more revealing attitude of the crewmen. “Don’t
volunteer information because that would be showing disrespect. But
don’t hold back when they ask you.”
“But, gosh, Captain, they’re lizards and we’re people. And if they
learn how to handle the ship, and make ships of their own--”
“What do we care? The only thing we’re interested in is keeping alive,
isn’t it?”
Kerman nodded uncertainly.
“In that case, there’s only one thing to do. Tell them what they want
to know. Keep on the good side of them.”
“Okay, Captain,” said Kerman resignedly. “Now, they’ve been asking
about all this metal we got stored on the ship. They figure that if we
want it, it’s valuable to them too. They want us to show them how to
get more.”
“Show them. I thought I heard you yourself say, Kerman, that we’ll show
them.”
Kerman grinned shamefacedly. “I didn’t mean it that way, Captain. I
meant the people back in the System. But we’ll show these lizards too.”
We make good slaves, thought Grayson, perfect slaves. Fortunately there
is a bit of critical information that most of the men don’t usually
recall. I’ll have to warn one or two of the technicians though, not to
pass it on. As for the rest, we toil away with hand and brain, and day
by day the A-race is learning most of the precious knowledge we have
acquired, it is learning to work the machinery we have so painfully
built. An invulnerable race can’t be stopped, he told himself bitterly,
it can’t be harmed, and it can’t be resisted.
You can only let them pick the treasures of your mind and take charge
of the material treasures you came here to gather. Wonder if the human
race will appreciate what I’m up against, he thought. Of course it will
never know, but I wonder if it would appreciate if it _did_ know.
Not likely. More likely every last one of them would damn me for
what I’ve done. And they’d be right. I hated them, and I’m paying
for my hatred. Strange that now I hate the A-race more. Here it
is, concentrated in a few square miles around the ship, hemmed
in by enemies on its own planet, prepared to play the role of
galaxy-conqueror. If only there were time for a warning--
There wasn’t. There was no time to spread the news, and even if there
had been, there would have been no time for a battle cruiser to arrive
quickly enough to drop its atomic bomb and wipe out the core of the
A-race.
Of course, if such a bomb could have been dropped--there would be the
end of the ship that served the A-race as model, of the human beings
who served them as teachers. Those of the A-race who had already
acquired human knowledge would also be wiped out with them, and the
scattered members left on the outposts would probably be helpless
against the onslaughts of their smaller relatives.
A big _if_, an impossible _if_. Was it, though? If you toiled
faithfully, if you got your men to work hard, and helped them
concentrate and purify the precious metal, and collect it all in one
spot, watching the quantity grow and grow, until--
He called his men together and they stood there silent. There
they were, the surly ones, the crazy ones, all those who had felt
persecuted, and hated their own kind.
“Men,” he said, “you’ve been taking it too easy. Remember, the sooner
we do what these lizards want, the sooner we go back to our own
System.” A lie, of course. They would never go back. “I want you to
stop loafing and get a move on.”
“And turn the System over to these lizards? I’ll see them in hell
first. And you with them, Captain, you with them. Boys--”
“All right, boys,” said Grayson genially. “Back to work. And remember,
speed it up now.”
* * * * *
And now the layers of metal bars filled a small chamber in the ship,
and the precious hoard he had been so helpfully collecting was almost
complete. Three heaps with a space in the center they were now, three
heaps, each below the critical stage, but already warm with the
neutrons streaming through their slowly disintegrating atoms. He held
the last bar of U235 in his hand, and he knew that he had only to place
it in the spot reserved for it to make the mass exceed the critical
size, to turn it into a nuclear bomb, to make it explode suddenly in
an atomic blast whose fierceness would vaporize ship and slaves and
masters with a roar never before heard or imagined on this planet.
His face wore almost the same happy smile that had once amused him on
Kerman’s face. “We’ll show them,” he said cheerfully. “We’ll show them.”
But it was a smile without hatred. He put the bar into place, and
everything was gone at once. Where there had been a ship and hatred
there was now only a vast hollow in the molten ground.
Transcriber’s note:
This etext was produced from Rocket Stories, April 1953 (Vol. 1, No.
1). Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
copyright on this publication was renewed.
Obvious errors have been silently corrected, but minor
inconsistencies have been retained as printed.
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
public domain.
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