When six days passed with no reaction from the ocean, we decided to repeat the experiment.
Until now, the Station had been located at the intersection of the forty-third parallel and the116th meridian. We moved south, maintaining a constant altitude of 1200 feet above the ocean—our radar confirmed automatic observations relayed by the artificial satellite which indicateda build-up of activity in the plasma of the southern hemisphere.
Forty-eight hours later, a beam of X-rays modulated by my own brain-patterns wasbombarding the almost motionless surface of the ocean at regular intervals.
At the end of this two-day journey we had reached the outskirts of the polar region. The disc ofthe blue sun was setting to one side of the horizon, while on the opposite side billowing purpleclouds announced the dawn of the red sun. In the sky, blinding flames and showers of greensparks clashed with the dull purple glow. Even the ocean participated in the battle between thetwo stars, here glittering with mercurial flashes, there with crimson reflections. The smallestcloud passing overhead brightened the shining foam on the wave-crests with iridescence. Theblue sun had barely set when, at the meeting of ocean and sky, indistinct and drowned inblood-red mist (but signalled immediately by the detectors), a symmetriad blossomed like agigantic crystal flower. The Station held its course, and after fifteen minutes the colossal rubythrobbing with dying gleams was once again hidden beneath the horizon. Some minutes later, athin column spouted thousands of yards upwards into the atmosphere, its base obscured fromview by the curvature of the planet. This fantastic tree, which went on growing and gushingblood and quicksilver, marked the end of the symmetriad: the tangled branches at the top of thecolumn melted into a huge mushroom shape, illuminated by both suns simultaneously, andcarried on the wind, while the lower part bulged, broke up into heavy clusters, and slowly sank.
The death-throes lasted well over an hour.
Another two days passed. Our X-rays had irradiated a vast stretch of the ocean, and we made afinal repetition of the experiment. From our observation post we spotted a chain of islets twohundred and fifty miles to the south—six rocky promontories encrusted with a snowysubstance which was in fact a deposit of organic origin, proving that the mountainousformation had once been part of the ocean bed.
We then moved south-west, and skirted a chain of mountains capped by clouds which gatheredduring the red day, and then disappeared. Ten days had elapsed since the first experiment.
On the surface, not much was happening in the Station. Sartorius had programmed theexperiment for automatic repetition at set intervals. I did not even know whether anybody waschecking the apparatus for correct function. In fact, the calm was not as complete as it seemed,but not because of any human activity.
I was afraid that Sartorius had no real intention of abandoning the construction of the disruptor.
And how would Snow react when he found out that I had kept information from him andexaggerated the dangers we might run in the attempt to annihilate neutrino structures? Yetneither of the two said anything further about the project, and I kept wondering why they wereso silent. I vaguely suspected them of keeping something from me—perhaps they had beenworking in secret—and every day I inspected the room which housed the disruptor, awindowless cell situated directly underneath the main laboratory. I never found anybody in theroom, and the layer of dust over the armatures and cables of the apparatus proved that it hadnot been touched for weeks.
As a matter of fact, I did not meet anybody anywhere, and could not get through to Snow anymore: nobody answered when I tried to call the radio-cabin. Somebody had to be controllingthe Station's movements, but who? I had no idea, and oddly enough I considered the questionwas out of my province. The absence of response from the ocean left me equally indifferent, somuch so that after two or three days I had stopped being either hopeful or apprehensive, andhad completely written off the experiment and its possible results.
For days on end, I remained sitting in the library or in my cabin, accompanied by the silentshadow of Rheya. I was aware that there was an unease between us, and that my state ofmindless suspension could not go on forever. Obviously it was up to me to break the stalemate,but I resisted the very idea of any kind of change: I was incapable of making the most trivialdecision. Everything inside the Station, and my relationship with Rheya in particular, feltfragile and insubstantial, as if the slightest alteration could shatter the perilous equilibrium andbring down ruin. I could not tell where this feeling originated, and the strangest thing of all isthat Rheya too had a similar experience. When I look back on those moments today, I have astrong conviction that this atmosphere of uncertainty and suspense, and my presentiment ofimpending disaster, was provoked by an invisible presence which had taken possession of theStation. I believe too that I can claim that this presence manifested itself just as powerfully indreams. I have never had visions of that kind before or since, so I decided to note them downand to transcribe them approximately, in so far as my vocabulary permits, given that I canconvey only fragmentary glimpses almost entirely denuded of an incommunicable horror.
A blurred region, in the heart of vastness, far from earth and heaven, with no ground underfoot,no vault of sky overhead, nothing. I am the prisoner of an alien matter and my body is clothedin a dead, formless substance—or rather I have no body, I am that alien matter. Nebulous palepink globules surround me, suspended in a medium more opaque than air, for objects onlybecome clear at very close range, although when they do approach they are abnormallydistinct, and their presence comes home to me with a preternatural vividness. The conviction ofits substantial, tangible reality is now so overwhelming that later, when I wake up, I have theimpression that I have just left a state of true perception, and everything I see after opening myeyes seems hazy and unreal.
That is how the dream begins. All around me, something is awaiting my consent, my inneracquiescence, and I know, or rather the knowledge exists, that I must not give way to anunknown temptation, for the more the silence seems to promise, the more terrible the outcomewill be. Yet I essentially know no such thing, because I would be afraid if I knew, and I neverfeel the slightest fear.
I wait. Out of the enveloping pink mist, an invisible object emerges, and touches me. Inert,locked in the alien matter that encloses me, I can neither retreat nor turn away, and still I ambeing touched, my prison is being probed, and I feel this contact like a hand, and the handrecreates me. Until now, I thought I saw, but had no eyes: now I have eyes! Under the caress ofthe hesitant fingers, my lips and cheeks emerge from the void, and as the caress goes further Ihave a face, breath stirs in my chest—I exist. And recreated, I in my turn create: a face appearsbefore me that I have never seen until now, at once mysterious and known. I strain to meet itsgaze, but I cannot impose any direction on my own, and we discover one another mutually,beyond any effort of will, in an absorbed silence. I have become alive again, and I feel as ifthere is no limitation on my powers. This creature—a woman?—stays near me, and we aremotionless. The beat of our hearts combines, and all at once, out of the surrounding void wherenothing exists or can exist, steals a presence of indefinable, unimaginable cruelty. The caressthat created us and which wrapped us in a golden cloak becomes the crawling of innumerablefingers. Our white, naked bodies dissolve into a swarm of black creeping things, and I am—weare—a mass of glutinous coiling worms, endless, and in that infinity, no, I am infinite, and Ihowl soundlessly, begging for death and for an end. But simultaneously I am dispersed in alldirections, and my grief expands in a suffering more acute than any waking state, a pervasive,scattered pain piercing the distant blacks and reds, hard as rock and ever-increasing, amountain of grief visible in the dazzling light of another world.
That dream was one of the simplest. I cannot describe the others, for lack of a language toconvey their dread. In those dreams, I was unaware of the existence of Rheya, nor was thereany echo of past or recent events.
There were also visionless dreams, where in an unmoving, clotted silence I felt myself beingslowly and minutely explored, although no instrument or hand touched me. Yet I felt myselfbeing invaded through and through, I crumbled, disintegrated, and only emptiness remained.
Total annihilation was succeeded by such terror that its memory alone makes my heart beatfaster today.
So the days passed, each one like the next. I was indifferent to everything, fearing only thenight and unable to find a means of escape from the dreams. Rheya never slept. I lay besideher, fighting against sleep, and the tenderness with which I clung to her was only a pretext, away of avoiding the moment when I would be compelled to close my eyes. I had notmentioned these nightmares to her, but she must have guessed, for her attitude involuntarilybetrayed a sense of deep humiliation.
As I say, I had not seen Snow or Sartorius for some time, yet Snow gave occasional signs oflife. He would leave a note at my door, or call me on the videophone, asking whether I hadnoticed any new event or change, or anything at all which could be interpreted as a response tothe repeated X-ray bombardments. I told him No, and asked him the same question, but therein the little screen Snow only shook his head.
On the fifteenth day after the conclusion of the experiment, I woke up earlier than usual,exhausted by the previous night's dreams. All my limbs were numbed, as if emerging from theeffects of a powerful narcotic. The first rays of the red sun shone through the window, ablanket of red flame ripped over the surface of the ocean, and I realized that the vast expansewhich had not been disturbed by the slightest movement in the past four days was beginning tostir. The dark ocean was abruptly covered by a thin veil of mist which seemed at the same timeto have a very palpable consistency. Here and there the mist shook, and tremors spread out tothe horizon in all directions. Now the ocean disappeared altogether beneath thick, corrugatedmembranes with pink swellings and pearly depressions, and these strange waves suspendedabove the ocean swirled suddenly and coalesced into great balls of blue-green foam. A tempestof wind hurled them upwards to the height of the Station, and wherever I looked, immensemembranous wings were soaring in the red sky. Some of these wings of foam, which blottedout the sun, were pitch-black, and others shone with highlights of purple as they were exposedobliquely to the sunlight. Still the phenomenon continued, as if the ocean were mutating, orshedding an old scaly skin. Now and again the dark surface of the ocean could be glimpsedthrough a gap that the foam filled in an instant. Wings of foam planed all around me, only afew yards from the window, and one swooped to rub against the window pane like a silkenscarf. As the ocean went on giving birth to these fantastic birds, the first flights were alreadydissipating high above, decomposing at their zenith into transparent filaments.
The Station remained motionless as long as the spectacle lasted—about three hours, until nightintervened. And even after the sun had set and the shadows had spread over the ocean, the luridglow of myriads of wings could still be discerned rising into the sky, hovering in massed ranks,and climbing effortlessly towards the light.
This performance had terrified Rheya, but it was no less disconcerting for me, although itsnovelty ought not to have been disturbing, since two or three times a year, and oftener whenluck smiled on them, Solarists observed forms and creations never previously recorded.
The following night, an hour before the blue sunrise, we witnessed another effect: the oceanwas becoming phosphorescent. Pools of grey light were rising and falling to the rhythm ofinvisible waves. Isolated at first, these grey patches quickly spread and joined together, andsoon made up a carpet of spectral light extending as far as the eye could see. The intensity ofthe light grew progressively for some fifteen to twenty minutes, then the phenomenon came toa surprising end. A pall of shadow approached from the west, stretching along a front severalhundred miles wide. When this moving shadow had overtaken the Station, the phosphorescentpart of the ocean, retreating eastward, seemed to be trying to escape from the vast extinguisher.
It was like an aurora put to flight, and retreating as far as the horizon, which was edged by afading glow before the darkness conquered. Shortly afterwards, the sun rose above the oceanwastes, which were furrowed by a few solidified waves, whose mercurial reflections played onmy window.
The phosphorescence was a recorded effect, sometimes observed before the eruption of anasymmetriad, but always indicative of a local increase in the activity of the plasma.
Nevertheless, in the course of the next two weeks nothing happened either inside or outside theStation, except on one occasion when in the middle of the night I heard the sound of a piercingscream which came from no human throat. The shrill, protracted howling woke me out of anightmare, and at first I thought that it was the beginning of another. Before falling asleep, Ihad heard dull noises coming from the direction of the laboratory, part of which lay directlyover my cabin. It sounded like heavy objects and machinery being shifted. When I realized thatI was not dreaming, I decided that the scream also came from above, but could not understandhow it managed to penetrate the sound-proof ceiling. The terrible sounds went on for almosthalf an hour, until my nerves jangled and I was pouring with sweat. I was about to go up andinvestigate when the screaming stopped, to be replaced by more muffled sounds as of objectsbeing dragged across the floor.
Rheya and I were sitting in the kitchen two days later when Snow came in. He was dressed aspeople dress on Earth after their day's work, and looked like a different person, taller and older.
He did not look at us, or pull up a chair, but stood at the table, opened a can of meat and begancramming it down between mouthfuls of bread. His jacket sleeve brushed against the greasytop of the can.
"Look out, Snow, your sleeve!""What?" he grunted, then went on stuffing himself with food as if he had not eaten for days. Hepoured out a glass of wine, drank it at a gulp, sighed, and wiped his lips. Then he looked at mewith bloodshot eyes, and mumbled:
"So you've stopped shaving? Ah…"Rheya cleared the table. Snow swayed on his heels, then pulled a face and sucked his teethnoisily, deliberately exaggerating the action. He stared at me insistently:
"So you've decided not to shave?" I made no reply. "Believe me," he went on, "you're making amistake. That was how it started with him to…""Go and lie down.""What? Just when I feel like talking? Listen, Kelvin, perhaps it wishes well…perhaps it wantsto please us but doesn't quite know how to set about the job. It spies out desires in our brains,and only two per cent of mental processes are conscious. That means it knows us better thanwe know ourselves. We've got to reach an understanding with it. Are you listening? Don't youwant to? Why?"—he was sobbing by now—"why don't you shave?""Shut up!…you're drunk.""Me, drunk? And what if I am? Just because I drift about from one end of space to another andpoke my nose into the cosmos, does that mean I'm not allowed to get drunk? Why not? Youbelieve in the mission of mankind, don't you, Kelvin? Gibarian told me about you before hestarted letting his beard grow…It was a very good description. Just don't go to the lab, if youdon't want to lose your faith. It belongs to Sartorius—Faust in reverse…he's looking for a curefor immortality! He is the last knight of the Holy Contact, the man we need. His latestdiscovery is pretty good too…prolonged dying. Not bad, eh? Agonia perpetua…of the straw…the straw hats and still you don't drink, Kelvin?"He raised his swollen eyelids and looked at Rheya, who was standing quite still with her backto the wall. Then he began chanting:
"O fair Aphrodite, child of Ocean, your divine hand…" He choked with laughter. "It fits, eh,Kel…vin…"He broke off in a fit of coughing.
"Shut up! Shut up and get out!" I grated through clenched teeth.
"You're chucking me out? You too? You don't shave and you chuck me out? What about mywarnings, and my advice? Interstellar colleagues ought to help each other! Listen Kelvin, let'sgo down and open the traps and call out. It might hear us. But what's its name? We have namedall the stars and all the planets, even though they might already have had names of their own.
What a nerve! Come on, let's go down. We'll shout it such a description of the trick it's playedus that it will be touched. It will make us silver symmetriads, pray to us in calculus, send us itsblood-stained angels. It will share our troubles and terrors, and beg us to help it die. It isalready begging us, imploring us. It implores us to help it die with every one of its creations.
You're not amused…but you know I'm just a joker. If man had more of a sense of humor,things might have turned out differently. Do you know what he wants to do? He wants topunish this ocean, hear it screaming out of all its mountains at once. If you think he'll neverhave the nerve to submit his plan to that bunch of doddering ancients who sent us here toredeem sins we haven't committed, you're right—he is afraid. But he is only afraid of the littlehat. He won't let anybody see the little hat, he won't dare, not Faust…"I said nothing. Snow's swaying increased. Tears were streaming down his cheeks and onto hisclothes. He went on:
"Who is responsible? Who is responsible for this situation? Gibarian? Giese? Einstein? Plato?
All criminals…Just you think, in a rocket a man takes the risk of bursting like a balloon, orfreezing, or roasting, or sweating all his blood out in a single gush, before he can even cry out,and all that remains is bits of bone floating inside armored hulls, in accordance with the laws ofNewton as corrected by Einstein, those two milestones in our progress. Down the road we go,all in good faith, and see where it gets us. Think about our success, Kelvin; think about ourcabins, the unbreakable plates, the immortal sinks, legions of faithful wardrobes, devotedcupboards…I wouldn't be talking this way if I weren't drunk, but sooner or later somebody wasbound to say it, weren't they? You sit there like a baby in a slaughterhouse, and you let yourbeard grow…Who's to blame? Find out for yourself."He turned slowly and went out, putting an arm out against the doorpost to steady himself. Thenhis footsteps died away along the corridor.
I tried not to look at Rheya, but my eyes were drawn to hers in spite of myself. I wanted to getup, take her in my arms and stroke her hair. I did not move.