Robert Silverberg

“ We had been heading toward a flat mountain wall that rose abruptly from the desert about a mile from the ship when—from nowhere—the creature appeared, towering above the desert like a dinosaur dropped from the skies.
But no dinosaur ever looked like this one. Sixty feet high, its skin a loathsome gray-green quivering jelly with thick hairy cilia projecting, its vat-like mouth gaping toothily, its cold, hard eyes flicking back and forth, searching for us as we flattened ourselves out of sight, it was an utterly ghastly being. Evolution had gone wild on this planet. ”

“ I saw the horror on Val's face, and I knew she felt the same way I did.
"Do you really think you can succeed?" I taunted him. "Really think you can kill every Earthman on Mars? Of all the insane, cockeyed—"
Val's quick, worried head-shake cut me off. But Ledman had felt my words, all right.
"Yes! I'll get even with every one of you for taking away my legs! If we hadn't meddled with the atom in the first place, I'd be as tall and powerful as you, today—instead of a useless cripple in a wheelchair." ”

“ The Undertube pulled out of the station and shot bullet-like through its dark tunnel. Silently, Alan thought about his night's experience. He saw he still had much, very much to learn about life on Earth.
Hawkes had a gift—the gift of winning. But he didn't abuse that gift. He concealed it a little, so the people who lacked his talent did not get too jealous of him. Jealousy ran high on Earth; people here led short ugly lives, and there was none of the serenity and friendliness of life aboard a starship. ”

“ The tide of female guards swept over us like a herd of cattle, and abruptly I found myself in the midst of a vast heaving mass of struggling women. At first I thought they were after Sam and Phil, who had tried to steal me and failed—but the truth dawned only after I had eluded the steel-like clutches of one powerful mademoiselle and fallen right into another's arms. ”

“ Assassinating Winslow would not be star-snuffing; he knew he could do it as casually as van Alen had blasted the blue wolf, back in Iowa Province.
He knew he should be quaking at the thought of murdering his own Duke, but the necessary quaking refused to come.
What's wrong with me? he asked himself desperately. Why am I different?
A man was supposed to feel loyalty to his Duke. Kesley did not. Why?
He had had a chance to kill Miguel. Perhaps that had all been illusion; perhaps he would have been struck down by an invisible guard the moment the knife's tip approached the Immortal's flesh. ”

“ Right in front of Abel Harwood's house, the vortex was open—and coming up through it were what we later knew as the Invaders. Globes of light, radiant and intangible, floating up out of nowhere and ringing themselves in the air like so many loathsome jellyfish. ”

“ Elliot was dazed, but he knew he still had to act fast. He sprang from the overturned jeep, with Blayne behind him. The tree-snake that had caused him to swerve was still coming toward them, its white fangs dripping venom.
It sprang forward to strike, but Elliot's hand was faster. He closed his fingers savagely around the reptile's neck. He held the head at arm's length.
The snake's twelve-foot body whipped around Elliot's throat and chest, pinning one arm to his side. The rocket pilot felt the dry, loathsome odor of the reptile drifting into his nostrils, and retched. ”

“ Devall scowled; from the pale, tense, unhappy faces of the men in the jeep, he could tell something was very wrong. That blood-red sunset had foretold accurately, he thought, as he dashed down the steps from his study.
Seven pairs of eyes focussed on him as he strode toward the group: eight glittering alien eyes, warmly golden, and six shifting, uneasy Terran eyes.
"What's going on out here?" Devall demanded.
The aliens set up an immediate babble of noise, chattering away like a quartet of squirrels. Devall had never seen any of them behaving this way before. ”

“ We left the farm that night, scattering in every direction, anxious to begin life. All that went before was a dream from which we now awakened. We agreed to meet at the farm each year, on the anniversary of her death, in memory of the woman who had so painstakingly divided a zygote into thirty-two viable cells, and who had spent a score of years conducting an experiment based on a theory that had proven to be utterly false.
We felt no regret, no qualm. We had done what needed to be done, and on that last day some of us had finally functioned in the professions for which Mother had intended us. ”

“ Carter stared down at the horror in the pit. Again the wave of thought rolled up. I am your master, strange one.
The force of the thing's mind overwhelmed him; he rocked dizzily, but kept his balance. Now, he knew what had happened, why Gendron had behaved as he did.
The Vanguard had landed on unexplored Deneb IV, and the minds of its crew of twelve had been snared by the Khethlani. It had turned them into so many puppets. ”