“Do you mean to say the fish have seen some probes before ours?”
“I couldn’t tell you what they have encountered. But why else would they need a magnetic detector sense?”
“I really wouldn’t know, damn it!” grumbled Rohan. He regarded the torn metal garlands and leaned over the railing. The bent ends of the black metal rods trembled slightly in the robot’s slipstream. Ballmin used long pliers to pinch off some wires sticking out from a tunnel-shaped opening.
“Let me tell you,” he continued, “there could never have been very high temperatures around here; otherwise you would find traces of oxidation on these metal surfaces. So much for your hypothesis about a fire having caused this destruction.”
“Any hypotheses would fail the test here,” muttered Rohan. “You know, I just can’t see the connection between this maze and the fact that the
“That can’t always have been the case.”
“Maybe it was alive a thousand years ago, but not just a few years back. There is nothing else for us to do here. Let’s return to the convoy down there.”
They did not exchange another word until the robot landed in front of the green signal lights. Rohan ordered the technician to let the television cameras roll and transmit a report to the
He and the scientists withdrew to the cabin of the lead vehicle. They released additional oxygen into the air supply of the tiny room, then they ate and drank coffee from their thermos bottles. The white light of the overhead fluorescent lamp felt pleasant to Rohan’s eyes after the red daylight of this planet. Ballmin spat into a paper napkin; it was some sand that had insinuated its way into the mouthpiece of his breathing mask and gritted between his teeth.
“That reminds me of something,” said Gralew unexpectedly, as he screwed down the top of his thermos bottle. His thick black hair glistened in the light of the fluorescent lamp. “I’ll tell you about it, but don’t take it too seriously.”
“If it reminds you of anything at all, that means something,” replied Rohan with his mouth full. “Shoot!”
“It’s nothing special, really. I heard a story a long time ago, almost a fairy tale, about the inhabitants of the Lyre constellation.”
“Why a fairy tale? They did exist. Achramian even published a treatise about it,” remarked Rohan. A small bulb began to flicker behind them on the dashboard, a sign that contact had been established with the
“Yes. Payne suspected some of the inhabitants may have succeeded in saving themselves in time. I’m not so sure that he is right there. They must have all perished when the nova exploded.”
“That took place sixteen light years from this planet,” said Gralew. “I don’t know the book. But I did hear somewhere that these people tried to escape. They presumably sent spaceships to all the planets of the other stars in their vicinity. They were well acquainted with the principle of space flight close to the speed of light.”
“And then?”
“That’s all I heard. Sixteen light years is not such an enormous distance. Why shouldn’t one of their spaceships have landed here?”
“Then you think they might still be somewhere around?”
“I couldn’t say. I was just reminded of them when I saw these ruins. They might have been their buildings, who knows?”
“What did they look like?” asked Rohan. “Did they resemble us?”
“According to Achramian, they did,” replied Ballmin. “But that is just another hypothesis. Practically no trace of them has survived, not even as much as from our own Pithecanthropus.”
“Strange.”
“Not at all. Their planet submerged for thousands of years in the chromosphere of the nova. Sometimes its surface temperature exceeded ten thousand degrees. Even the rocky foundation of the planetary crust underwent a complete metamorphosis. No trace remained of the oceans. The entire planet was thoroughly cooked. Just think of it, ten thousand years in the middle of the fires of a nova!”
“Then you really think it’s conceivable that some of these people might have survived here on Regis III? But why should they hide? And where could they be?”
“Perhaps they’ve died since then. I don’t know the answers. I simply voiced what crossed my mind when I saw these ruins.”
The men fell silent. Suddenly an alarm signal flared up on the dashboard.
Rohan jumped up and grabbed the headphones.
“Rohan here. What did you say? Oh, it’s you! Yes! Yes! I’m listening! All right, we’ll return at once!”
His face had turned pale. He turned to the rest and said: “Group II has found the
THE CONDOR
From a distance the rocket looked like a leaning tower. This impression was strengthened by the sand massed around it. Since the wind came from the west the sand wall had pulled up much higher than the east. Several tractors near the rocket had been almost totally buried by the sand. Even the antimatter mortar had been put out of action. It stood there with its hood raised, half filled with sand. But one could still see the jet openings at the ship’s nose which rested in an unobstructed depression in the ground. One had only to remove a thin layer of sand in order to reach the objects that lay strewn around the ramp.
The group stopped at the edge of the western dune wall. The vehicles they had brought along from the
The ramp was suspended about five yards above the ground, as if it had been suddenly stopped in midair while it was lowered downwards. The elevator, however, was untouched and its open door beckoned the men to enter. Nearby oxygen bottles stuck out from the sand. Their aluminum sheaths glistened brightly as if somebody had left them lying there just a few minutes earlier. Several steps further on, a blue object rested gleaming on the sandy ground. It was a plastic container, as they noticed on closer inspection. Everywhere inside the hollow around the foot of the spaceship was scattered a vast quantity of all kinds of things: cans of food, some full, some empty; theodolites, cameras, tripods, canisters, some still intact, others badly damaged.
As if someone had thrown the whole mess helter skelter out of the rocket, thought Rohan, and looked up at the darkened hole through which the crew would usually leave or enter the spaceship. The hatch was halfway open.
The small flying scouter robot that accompanied deVries’ expedition had found the dead spaceship quite by accident. DeVries had not tried to enter the
Rohan noticed something round on the ground, thinly covered by sand. With his foot he scraped away the fine sand, assuming he would dig up a small globe. Not suspecting anything, he kept on raking until he brought to daylight a pale yellow vault-like form. He recoiled rapidly, stifling a startled outcry. Alarmed, his companions turned around, looking at him. He held a human skull in his hand.
They found more bones and even a complete skeleton in a spacesuit. Between the dropping jaw and the upper teeth stuck the mouthpiece of the oxygen apparatus. The manometer had stopped at 46 atmospheres. Jarg knelt down and slowly turned the valve. The gas escaped with a hissing noise. Because of the dry desert air no trace of rust had formed on the metal parts of the reduction valve; it worked easily.
