three ex-humans in artificial bodies crafted by the creature below them. They were silent as Plank finished his preparations and prepared to trigger the scout into its final blink. «Now,» Plank said, beginning the mental order that would send the scout into its final blink. No, he heard. The word was in his mind. He felt a surge of frustration, as he tried desperately to complete the order. He was frozen. Time was at a standstill. He knew, then, that the Eater was all-powerful, that he had detected them, had frustrated them once again. We cannot allow that, the voice in his mind continued. Plank felt both
relief and wonder, because the voice was not that of the Eater. It is, after all, of us. Plank felt a small wrench of movement and looked out with his ship's eyes to see a starfield totally unfamiliar to him. Instantly he directed a
chart check, but there was nothing to relate with the charts. The entire sky had changed. The closeup viewers showed a blue planet, at orbital distance, a planet he'd never seen before. The final effort, the last hope, had failed. He wanted to hit something, longed to have his own fists back, if only to be able to bang one of them into a wall. When in doubt, he thought desperately, strike out. Look for something to hit. He moved his mind to direct the ship to close on the planet below. The ship, however, was already in movement, and he had no control. He was cut out of the command circuit. «What is it, John?» Hara asked. «I heard the voice. Is it another one of them?» «I don't know,» Plank said, «but I have a feeling we'll know very soon.» The ship was closing rapidly. Below them, the planet was growing. The viewers showed a natural landscape of great beauty. Large oceans, wide plains, mountains and lakes. Plank tried to use the scanners and was still blocked from his own ship. He had no way of knowing what sort of life awaited them on the planet, but he was certain life was there. Someone, some force, was directing the ship down toward the foothills of a huge, snow-capped range of mountains at the center of an elongated landmass. CHAPTER SIXTEEN The low, rolling hills were on fire with color, thousands of blossoms on the bushes and trees like part of a landscape painted by a master of composition. Nothing was out of place. Plank had the feeling that he was in the midst of a huge formal garden, not a stylized, symmetrical garden, but a garden of cunning naturalness. Some of the trees were fruited, bearing delicate blooms and delicious-looking fruits at the same time. In the open spaces beneath the trees, a lacy green ground cover allowed no intruding rock, no detracting patch of soil to show. Insects buzzed happily from bloom to bloom. The ship's ears picked up melodious pipings that seemed to originate from brightly colored birds flitting gracefully about. The outside temperature was 24 degrees Celsius. The atmosphere was oxygen-based and astoundingly free of impurities. The sky was clear blue, accented by beautiful white clouds, carrying no threat of rain. The Pride had settled into a small clearing at the base of a valley between two hills, near a clear stream that ran over smooth, water-worn stones into languid pools. In no mood to sit quietly and appreciate the beauty, Plank paced, in his mobile form, and remembered the Eater back on Earth, remembered the dazed and mute acceptance of the people. Ease yourself, the voice said in his mind, he has been removed. Hara darted a quick glance at him, indicating that she, too, had heard the voice. Heath muttered under his breath. You may walk, the voice told them. We think you will enjoy it. «Do we have a choice?» Plank snarled. There was no reply. He opened a
lock, and they went out into the idyllic countryside, feeling the lacy ground cover give beneath their feet. They did not question or discuss their direction. They seemed to know. They walked along by the stream, climbed beside a small waterfall to the high point of the valley. The view was breathtaking. Across another small glen ahead of them, a steep hill shot upward
almost vertically. Near the top, tucked under a glistening crystal overhang, blended into its natural surroundings was a building. In its construction the soft tones of an alabasterlike material blended with the pure tones of crystals. The bright, gay birds seemed to call to them as the three walked toward the hill. A cooling breeze wafted around them and stirred the perfume of the blossoms into a heady draft. They went forward in silence, their eyes
on the building at the crest of the hill. When they stood directly below it, no means of access was apparent until, with an almost imperceptible motion, they were lifted through the heady air. With a slight inward move, they were deposited onto an open balcony. In front of them a door opened. Plank led the way into a room of such beauty that Hara gasped in admiration. Sounds of running water from a trickling artificial brook dividing the room in two were mixed with the softness of music. The lighting seemed muted, but had no hint of dimness. Along the walls artistic constructions sparkled in crystals and colors. The ceiling was painted like a sky with pink and blue tinted clouds. Beside the brook was a sunken seating area. They stood, feeling almost out of place in the splendor, the quiet luxury. On the far wall a crystal panel shimmered, clouded, opened and the woman stepped through, flowed through, moving with a awe-inspiring grace. Her beauty made Plank's throat dry. Beside him, Hara sighed. «I did not intend that effect,» the woman said. «Would this make you more at ease?» Before the change she had been a creature out of a dream, tall, perfectly formed, her body barely covered by a silken sheath that fell to her shapely thighs in clinging glory. After the change the contrast was grotesque. Her face was now a thing from a nightmare, a bleached and shrunken skull from a charnel house, the eyes sunken, the cheeks cracked and dry, the upper teeth exposed in a horrible grin. «I want you to be at ease,» she said. Plank was not usually a man who used profanity, but the word he said was earthy in the extreme. «No matter,» the woman said. Her face resumed its heavenly beauty. She motioned them toward the seating area, leading them, sweeping down the wide steps to the sunken area to pivot and look at them as they glanced at each other. Then she sat. Although he felt a bit intimidated, Plank had been pushed to the limit. «You said you had removed the Eater from Earth.» «Yes.» «You said he was one of you,» Plank said, his voice low and intense. «Are we going to be your afternoon snack?» She smiled at him. «All this in a mere few million years?» «Lady, are you civilized?» Plank asked. «Please, John,» Hara said. «We like to think we are,» she said. «And is this the royal 'we' or are there more of you?» Plank asked. «We are many.» «Good for you,» Plank said. «Maybe there will be one among you who is possessed of a shred of common decency.» «You have reason to be angry, man,» the woman said. «I think so,» Plank agreed. «You see, we had no idea. We left your galaxy when there were giant reptiles on your Earth.» «Why didn't you eat the reptiles?» Plank asked, still fuming. «Even then we were beyond such practices,» she said calmly. «Would any of you like some refreshment?» «What we would like,» said Plank, «is the respect due to a living creature. What we want is our own freedom of choice without the interference of someone who can do mental tricks.» «Ah,» she said, laughing, «if you only knew how presumptuous you are.» She shifted, crossing one leg over the other. The effect was not lost on Plank and Heath. «All right, then. We will stop the preliminary chatter. You are here for a reason. I am tempted…» She smiled again. «Do you prefer the first person singular? You seem to object to our saying 'we.' Although, I assure you, it is much more descriptive.» «I am all in favor of knocking off the chatter,» Plank said. «I have told you that…» and she said a name, but it was a sound that was unintelligible to Plank's ears. The woman smiled again. «He is the one you think of as the Eater, or the monster. I have told you that he has been removed from your planet. Your people are no longer threatened by his childish game.» «Game?» Heath exploded.
«He thinks of it as that, not I,» she said. «Now, I believe it would be wise if you listen and let me talk.» She smiled and waited for comment. Plank shifted in the soft seat and looked at her. In his mind was a conflict. He kept seeing, in her beautiful face, the death's skull she had shown them. «You have reason for pride, for you have come a long way. There is reason, also, for humbleness, because you are, after all, only an accident. When we left your galaxy your ancestry was eating vegetation on a thousand planets.» «Sorry,» Plank said, «I don't buy that.» «You yourself ran tests on the planet you call Plank's World. You noted the amazing—that's the way you expressed it— similarity between your cells and the cells of the slugs.» «May I ask how you know all this?» Plank asked. She laughed. «You made it rather difficult,» she said. «We had to search through the remains of…» Once again there was that ear-twisting name. «…'s planet. Fortunately the data banks were rather well protected and were still intact. You will see just how fortunate that was for you later.» «Yes,» Plank said, «the cellular construction was similar.» «But still you doubt that you evolved from our food creatures.» «There's a body of pretty firm evidence on Earth that life was spontaneous on our planet. You mentioned the giant reptiles. Were they evolved from your creation?» «Life arises in many ways in the universe. However, advancement to intelligence is quite rare. Without a head start your rapid rise would have been impossible.» «Is that crucial to our discussion?» Plank asked. «Not really. Actually, we are very impressed by you. Only one other race we know of has shown such development.» «Yours,» Plank said. «Ours. There are vague similarities. We are very old and no race can trace itself to the beginning, but when your planet was the home of the giant reptiles we had achieved the ultimate state of development and were in the process of changing. We had, then, been in deep space for a million years.» «Why were you so slow?» Plank asked. For the first time an unpleasant expression marred the beauty of the woman's face. «Please do not try to antagonize me. You are, at best, an annoyance. We are being generous to give you our time to explain to you. There is a question to be resolved. First let me confirm one of your
