Fox B. Holden

“ Skeletons, reaching upward to a puffy, leaden sky.
The horizon split into jagged, broken moats of dark flame, and Earth was no longer what men had built, but what they eternally feared they must one day create....
Then Johnny Love was suddenly awake bolt upright in his cot and his eyes were open wide. His muscles were taut and cramped. And he was afraid although the men of Mars had offered friendship and told him that there was nothing for him to fear. ”

“ Smile, then, damn you....
"We want nothing, Earthman, but to prevent from happening on your planet the thing that happened on this. If they succeed in destroying you as they have us, then this System will always be under their heel, and we shall never be rid of them. Understand, their numbers were too few ever to conquer a planet with a civilization as large and as highly organized as that of Earth, by physical means.
"Knowing that, we—they call us gypsies, nomads, desert-scum today—we were not too alarmed when they landed here two centuries ago. ”

“ Those nomadic scum are like flies! No matter how many you exterminate, they never fail to come back in double their number. And they strike at the precise moment you are certain the bones of the last one are sinking beneath the sand. Somehow Central Patrol has got to get that unit back."
"You're certain it was a theft, then?"
"Don't be an idiot. Since when can those gypsies build anything more complex than a crude electrical generator? Let alone a psibeam unit? They've forgotten what little their civilization ever knew." ”

“ We wish to give you data to take back to your Earth which will banish disease for you—all disease. Data which will give you spacecraft that match our own in technical perfection. Data that will make you the undisputed masters of your environment. We offer you the stars, Earthman. ”

“ The men on one have learned to build boats which can successfully sail the sea within certain limits—they can visit the other islands, but are too frail and too limited in power to venture past the horizon. It is infinitely frustrating to them. The only places to which they may go are dead places. Save for one—only one, and it becomes magnified in importance—it becomes an entire raison d'etre in itself. For without it, the men with the boats sail uselessly....
"We are old, Earthman. We have watched you—waited for you for a long time. ”

“ Your planet was the ultimate target, but at first, your civilization was not adequately advanced to fall prey to their technique. Their weapon is knowledge, but the potentialities of that knowledge must be understood by a people before it can be effectively used to destroy them. ”

“ Johnny stared upward at the ceiling, got his eyes off the little shuttered aperture. He wished he had a cigarette. "You sound too damned much like a politician."
"Perhaps at this point you should be informed that your ship is completely repaired, and ready for your return to Earth whenever you desire."
"So, it's—You said Harrison and Janis would be here in nine days! That means I've been out for nearly two weeks! For a nap that's a long time, but nobody could get that bucket back in one piece in eleven days! Not after what I did to it—"
"Your ship is completely repaired, Earthman." ”

“ You think that barrel I cracked up was built in a Kindergarten class—"
"Space-flight requires but a relative minimum of those things, Earthman. Required most is psychological and philosophical conditioning."
"To what?"
"To all things unreal. Because they are the most real; infinity applies to probability and possibility far more directly than to simple Space and Time. But—are you calm now?" The voice was growing deeper, and seemed almost friendly. Johnny tried his muscles; they weren't paralyzed—he could move easily, and his head was clear. And there was no anger, now. ”

“ And from then, investigated your Earth from time to time ... and waited....
"Waited, because they knew you would be coming. And they knew what kind of men you would be. Strong men, with the light of the stars in your eyes. Yet confused, weak men, with the darkness of suspicion and jealousy still in your souls. Such are humans, after all....
"That is why we stopped you, Johnny Love. Once your blast-off ogee had carried you beyond the curvature of their horizon and brought you over us, our psibeam was effective and theirs were not. ”

“ The air chilled, and the grains and fruits wilted, and the rolling hills were a darker hue than green as the shadow lengthened, spread to the gleaming cities beyond and then as it touched them and ran soundlessly the length and breadth of their wide malls, there were other changes.... ”

“ A psibeam unit is unaccounted for, and despite our protective screening, the Earthman was visibly disturbed in his sleep. His encephalotapes show that clearly. They know about him, Andruul, and they're making their bid. Central Patrol had better be quick and certain this time."
Andruul kept his silence. But he thought. He thought Central Patrol was getting less efficient and more stupid every day.
It was a strange feeling; a feeling with which no human was emotionally equipped to deal. ”

“ But nobody is trying to hurt you, nobody's after your little desert paradise. We had an idea, that's all. We thought we could make it work. People have been talking 'go to Mars' on my planet for longer than most of 'em can remember. ”

“ The feeling ignited a new anger in him, and made him want to curse the teachings that had conditioned his lifetime of thinking to the belief that Man was more than an animal.
He'd been sold short....
"Damn you! God damn you, what are you going to do to me?"
In a corner of his mind he was aware of a gentle hissing sound, but he did not listen. The fear and terror had to be broken. Make them tell, make them tell....
His muscles grew heavy and his face was feverish with his effort, and his eyes stung. Something ... like roses. ”

“ There is little that they cannot do. Destruction is their forte. They could not keep us from preventing your taking their 'gift' to your people, but they could keep that 'gift' from falling into our hands—and they did. They do not always win. ”